


Sand Full of Stars

by mochigo (Chocoaddict)



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Attempt at Worldbuilding, BAMF Uzumaki Kushina, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, Minor Hatake Kakashi/Uchiha Obito, Multi, Siblings, Third Shinobi War, background minato/kushina, expanding on clans and subsequent social stratification, i love found family so we're getting found family, kaguya clan and traditions, kinda si/oc, ninja are weird, ppl getting families n staying alive, tearing down kirigakure and the land of water bc their gov sucks, uzu deserved better, with a sprinkle of other countries
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:21:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 35,532
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24938197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Chocoaddict/pseuds/mochigo
Summary: You'd think that being reborn on a tiny island on the edge of the Land of Water would keep you far away from the mess that's the shinobi countries. Except, sometimes things don't work out the way you thought they would, and sometimes you end up with one foot in a war and the other in a revolution.
Comments: 51
Kudos: 135
Collections: Amazing OFC fanfiction





	1. one

**Author's Note:**

> i literally spent hrs trying to put together the absolute clusterfuck of a timeline naruto is and got nothing from it so here i am, making my own shit up
> 
> i honestly still can't believe i wrote this considering that i haven't touched the naruto fandom in yrs but this is the only fic i've actually outlined from start to finish so it's gonna be wild

Her brother is trying to eat rocks again. The sharp, grinding crunch of bone and rock rings out through the air, grating to her ears, and she sighs, reaching over to pull his hand from his mouth before he can swallow. 

“No.” Miyuki points at the ground. “Out, Tetsu.” 

He pouts and presses his lips together. She counts to five in her head. Two year olds can be terribly stubborn, which makes her life even harder because they insist on doing whatever they feel like doing. 

Which is, at the moment, eating rocks from the ground. 

“ _Out_.” She repeats, hoping he’ll listen. He doesn’t. It’s time for a different method, then.

She squeezes his ruddy cheeks together, so that his front and bottom lips just out like a fish’s. His cheeks are lumpy and hard with rocks, which would alarm her if she hadn’t caught him doing the same exact thing multiple times. Tetsu whines before scrunching his face and spitting the rocks out in a slimy lump on the ground. 

Thankfully, the rock glob is bloodless--he’s lucky none of the rocks had cut up his gums this time. During one of the previous times she’d caught him chewing on some rocks, he’d actually reduced some of the stones to jagged pieces of pebble, which had in turn left deep, ragged cuts in his mouth. 

But instead of crying like most babies do when they’re in pain, he’d just kept chewing the rocks, blood and saliva leaking out of his lips. And what a mess that’d been. 

Why couldn’t her brother just teeth by chewing on anything other than _rocks_? This question was pointless because Tetsu never learned his lesson and it was something that even a god couldn’t answer, only Tetsu could. And Tetsu wasn’t telling her the secrets of the world any time soon.

The real question, though, was why the fuck were her brother’s barely grown baby teeth chowing down on rocks like crackers? She hadn't been this bad when she was two, right? Nowhere in her memory does eating rocks come up, because she’s pretty sure she’d remember something like that.

Good thing she’s past that age. She’s five and chewing rice for dinner like normal kids and currently babysitting while her mother gives birth to her newest sibling inside the house. 

They’re far enough outside that her mom’s screams are muffled and easy to distract the younger ones from with games. 

“Miyu!” She turns to see Naka running towards her with something cupped in his tiny hands. 

He’s grinning widely as he nears. “Look!” He shoves his hands right into her face and directly under her nose. His hands are mere millimeters away from poking out her eyeballs. 

Tightly gripping Tetsu’s hands in hers so that he can’t shove more rocks in his mouth while she isn’t looking, ignoring his high-pitched protests, she turns her attention to her other brother. Naka’s only eight months younger than her, and he doesn’t chew rocks, so that automatically grants him the title of favorite sibling. 

“Wow,” she tries not to turn her head away in disgust, and with the barest amount of inflection, “A bug. On a flower.” 

It’s a very ugly bug. Its legs are long and hairy, its body jointed and green, and it’s easily the size of her palm. She doesn’t add anything else because she’s too busy hoping that it won’t jump onto her face. 

“I know!” Naka rolls his eyes like he thinks she’s dumb and isn’t getting what he’s trying to show her. He’s probably thinking that, the little shit. “Who cares abou’ the bug! Look!” He shoves it even closer, nails edging precariously close to her eyeballs. 

She looks again, even at the cost of being cross eyed and seeing each individual hair on the bug’s legs. “I _am_.” 

“Yer _not_!” he retorts. “’S a chrysanthemum.” 

“Oh, yer favorite?” Naka’s been particularly obsessed with chrysanthemums lately, mostly because they have medicinal properties and make some pretty tasty tea. They’re pretty rare, though, so she has no idea where he even found one. She probably doesn’t want to know.

“Yeah,” he crouches down, excited, “I can write the kanji too!” Gently placing the flower beside him on the ground, he starts scratching the kanji into the dirt with a stick. 

The bug on the flower flies away and she heaves an internal sigh of relief. Tetsu has pulled himself away from her grip and is sitting near Naka, watching him write the kanji. 

“See?” Naka smiles proudly, and she pushes his sweaty, maroon bangs away from his eyes. They both need a haircut. 

None of them tie their hair up, although their mother has always tied either a small braid or a small piece of hair together on the side. It’s pretty miserable during hotter weather, especially since her hair sticks to the back of her neck, but it’s even worse for Naka because unlike the rest of them, he’s got thick, slightly curly hair. 

“Good job,” she says, crouching down to inspect the writing further. It’s surprisingly neat, the lines are smooth, considering that he wrote with a stick, and there’s not a stroke out of place. 

Sometimes Naka surprises her, because he acts like a kid but his mind snatches onto harder concepts and ideas. He’s definitely more advanced than the other four year olds on the island. “Were ya lookin’ at Taka-jii-san’s books again?” 

Takahiro’s the island’s doctor, and by doctor she means the guy everyone goes to for herbal remedies and help for injuries. He’s not the one in the house with her mom right now though, that’s Hanako, the midwife. Because the island’s still very antiquated in its ways, solid in its customs. 

She wouldn’t have thought it antiquated, had she not been born with a set of memories from another world, another life. The memories had slowly woven in through her dreams as she grew, and she recalled mostly everything at this point. 

Some things, she remembers clearly, like the recipe for homemade opera cake or how the earth revolves around the sun. They're all things that made up the world she lived in, small things and bits of knowledge, but she can barely remember what she held dearest to her. Although if she had remembered, she wouldn't have been able to bear it. 

Memories of the people she loved are heat-haze shimmers of a summer mirage, warmth lingering in the deepest corners of her heart. They're a home that no longer exists.   
  


But she’s got other people now, too.

Naka presses his shoulder into hers and giggles unabashedly. “I took ‘em this mornin’ when he wasn’t lookin’.” 

Her jaw drops. “ _Naka_ !” she starts, because you can’t just _steal_ from one of the most respected people on the island, only to be interrupted by his screeching when he finally notices Tetsu making a mess of his carefully etched kanji. 

“Stupid Te-chan!” Naka lunges towards Tetsu and pries him away from the now pile of dirt. “Ya messed it up!” 

Tetsu doesn’t appreciate being manhandled away from his masterpiece because he starts crying, fists flying. He actually manages to land a hit on Naka before she gets in between them, pulling Tetsu into her arms and blocking Naka with her back.

“It’s ok,” she soothes, running her hand along Tetsu’s back before he can erupt into a full-blown tantrum. She plants a kiss on his dirt smudged cheek and he turns his face into her stomach, cries quieting down. Smoothing her hand along his small, dark head, she faces Naka, annoyed.

“He hit me!” he protests, before she can say anything. His face is red with anger and exertion, and his arms are crossed defiantly. 

She pins him with a flat stare.

“Miyuki-nee!” He pulls the sounds of her full name, whining. His eyes are wide, begging her to be on his side.

Oh, so _now_ he plays the big sister card. 

“Naka, he was jus’ playin’. Ya can’t pull him like that, ya might hurt ‘im.” She can pull the big sibling card too. “Yer the older one, ya should be watchin’ out fer him.” 

“What! He started it! And! ’e messed up my kanji!” 

“And ya shouldn’t’ve pulled him.”

Naka falls silent at her sharp reprimand. “Fine,” he grounds out, “whatever.” He picks up the chrysanthemum, carefully tucking it into a pocket in his pants, and stomps away. 

Miyuki sighs, watching him fade from her line of sight. She trusts him to stay nearby and away from the more dangerous parts, and he needs time to cool off, too. Their neighbors will alert her if anything happens. 

Turning back to Tetsu, who’s managed to turn her shirt into a snot rag, she pats his head again. At that, he looks up at her, grey eyes still hazy with tears. He’s stopped crying now, and is just sniffling. 

“D’ya think ya did somethin’ bad?” she asks gently.

Still sniffling, he buries his head back into her shirt, smearing more of the snot around. 

“Tetsu.” 

“Sorry,” he mumbles from where his face is pressed into her stomach. 

Miyuki feels her face soften. “Ya shouldn’ draw on other people’s things without askin’, ok? Next time, if ya wanna draw, ask Naka-nii first.”

He nods, still not looking at her. She tugs his shoulders away so she can look at him. “Will ya tell Naka-nii yer sorry?”

When he nods, this time, he’s looking at her. She smiles, approving. “Do ya wanna find ‘im?”

“Yeah,” he says quietly, glancing to the side as if to look for him. 

She’s about to give him a piggyback when the young girl Hanako had brought to help her with the delivery bursts out of the house, dashing towards them. 

“Miyuki-chan, ya can come in now!” 

That means the baby was born safely. Miyuki feels her mouth stretch into a grin, heart fluttering excitedly. She takes a hold of Tetsu’s hand and starts leading him towards the house. 

The girl smiles at them, eyes bright. She’s kind enough to accompany them back, so Miyuki feels confident enough to ask her for a favor. 

“Can ya call my brother too? He’s still outside. He wen’ near the main road.” Naka definitely won’t have gone too far and she wants him to be there too. 

“Sure,” the girl smiles sweetly, and pats her head in the same way Miyuki had pat Tetsu’s. 

“Baby?” Tetsu chatters curiously, pulling her towards their mom’s bedroom. He’s pretty strong for a two year old, and surprisingly sturdy. Miyuki had asked her mom about it before, because she and Naka should’ve broken at least three bones by now, too. All she’d said was that they have strong bones. 

Well. She’s seen someone walk on the ocean before, crossing over strong tides without a boat to save a drowning kid, so strong bones aren't that much of a reach. 

“Mom!” Tetsu shrieks, upon entering the room, and their mom turns tired eyes to them, sweat slick hair sticking to the sharp, beautiful lines of her face. Tetsu immediately presses himself against the frame of the bed, and stretches onto his toes. This is the only room with a bed that has a frame since the rest of them use futons, but the bed is still short enough that Tetsu’s head pokes over it. 

Their father, standing next to their mother, lets out a breath and picks him up. Tetsu peers closely at the bundle in their mom’s arms, half hanging out of their father’s hold. 

Miyuki, too, is blinking in awe at the baby in her mom’s arms. 

“It’s your baby sister.” Her mom’s lips pull upwards slightly, and she looks as exhausted as she usually does. “Miho.” 

Naka bursts into the room just then, right before Miyuki can coo over her sister and her name, because his timing is always just a bit off like that. “’S that--” He cuts himself off and moves to stand near Miyuki, the girl trailing behind him. She breaks off to go help Hanako with the clean up. 

“Ya found ‘im, Chika-san?” Her father’s rough, naturally commanding voice makes the girl, Chika, look up from her task. 

“Oh. Yes, Hajime-san. He was jus’ playin’ nearby.” She looks a bit awkward at being called out in a room of people. 

He nods. “Thank you.”

“Don’t be so formal, Kazuo,” Hanako snorts, “it’s parta our work and the girl’s got a good head on her shoulders. Don’t you go actin’ like I didn’t help birth ya.” 

The tan cheeks of her father’s flush slightly, and he tries to go for a smile that looks more like a grimace. “My apologies, Hanako-san.” 

Hanako rolls her eyes. “What’d I jus’ say.” The wrinkled corners of her mouth are pinched in amusement, her grey hair pulled tightly into a bun. “Yer too stiff, Kazuo.” 

Her stiff father can do nothing other than lower his head. Testu tugs tightly on his hair, grabbing it by the fistful. “Yes, Hanako-san.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Naka interrupts, bored of the conversation, “so can I hold ‘er?”

“Naka,” her mom starts, “you must be _very_ careful.” She leans forward so Naka can see better. “Hold her exactly the way I show you.”

“Airo…” Kazuo trails off, brows furrowed. He eyes Naka with hesitance. 

“It’s fine,” her mom replies shortly, and turns her full attention to Naka. She gently places Miho in Naka’s outstretched arms, making sure that he supports her head with one hand. 

Naka exhales, quiet for once, watching Miho as she blinks sleepily at the world around her. He pulls her closer to his chest, wordless, and Miyuki smiles, seeing the expression on his face.

She edges closer, nudging him after a few moments. “Can I hold ‘er?” 

Naka very clearly wants to hoard her all to himself but he reluctantly passes Miho to her because she has authority over him on account of being older. She’s never going to stop lording her age over him because if she didn’t, he’d be swimming naked in the ocean right now. 

Miho is so _small_ , so delicate in her arms. Her heart squeezes, and she feels waves bursting against her ribs, heart expanding to ride them. “Hi,” she breathes, before passing her back into Airo’s waiting arms. 

“Alright, tha’s enough’a that.” Hanako bustles forward and shoos them out of the room. “Yer mom needs ta rest.” 

“Miyuki.” Kazuo’s voice stops her before she can leave the room. He lowers Tetsu to the ground and motions at him. 

Miyuki resists the urge to roll her eyes and tell him to use his words like the grown ass man he is but refrains from it, instead herding her youngest brother out along with Naka. 

Some days, she really just can’t bring herself to like her father. He works hard to make money and put food on the table, but he’s the type of person she can’t relate to. Unchanging in the island’s traditional ways, sometimes narrow-sighted, few on words, but easy to anger. 

Her mom is different, easier to love, because she loves her children fiercely in a way that shows. In the way she stays up late sewing new clothes for them, the way she uses money she could’ve used for a new dress on books for them, patiently teaching them to read even though Naka has the patience of a hummingbird. 

But it’s fine like this, Miyuki doesn’t see or talk to her father much anyway, and she’s too busy with her siblings to spare him any attention. He doesn’t make the effort, and she doesn’t either. 

It’s a balance that works out just fine. 

Before they leave the house, though, she makes Naka get the book he stole from Takahiro so they can bring it back. It’s still afternoon, so Takahiro should be at home. 

Their sweat from running around earlier has dried, so she snags a light jacket for Tetsu before they go out. She doesn’t bother getting one for Naka, because he’d just take it off after two seconds. It’s already autumn, and the weather here is mostly wet and warm, but the sea wind is ripe during typhoon season, unforgiving during the colder seasons and piercingly powerful.

Then they’re out the door, Testu’s hand firmly in hers, and they’re almost at Takahiro’s house when she happens to glance down at Naka’s feet.

She groans. “Naka, where’re yer shoes.” 

He shrugs. “Took ‘em off earlier. Dunno where.” The chrysanthemum is still sticking out of his pocket. “I hate ‘em.”

Miyuki’s going to find glue and glue his shoes to his goddamn feet. This is the fifth pair he’s lost in the past two months, and shoes aren’t the easiest to make. 

“Even Tetsu’s wearing his shoes.” He doesn’t like shoes much either, and she commiserates because the shoes are made of twisted straw and can get pretty itchy, but the rocks under their feet hurt more. 

Tetsu beams up at her proudly and laughs, sandaled foot scuffing against the ground as he skips. “Stupi’ nii-cha’!” 

Miyuki has to stifle a laugh at the look of outrage on Naka’s face. “Yer jus’ a dumb baby! An’ shoes are stupid!” He scowls and runs ahead of them, bare feet and all. One of the things Naka hates most is lectures, and he sure isn’t about to try his luck with Miyuki. 

“Naka!” she calls, but it’s futile because he isn’t listening anymore. 

It is what it is, she supposes, and ambles along, letting Tetsu pull down on her hand like a swing and watches as Naka deftly pulls himself through one of the open windows of Takahiro’s house.

After a bit, he reappears, mood much lighter, dropping down onto the soft grass where Miyuki and Tetsu are waiting under the window. There are thunder-like snores coming from inside the house and by the sound of it, Takahiro’s taking his afternoon nap.

“He’s always sleepin’.” Naka’s grins meanly, “Ol’ fart never lemme borrow his books but when I take ‘em he never notices.” 

Miyuki rolls her eyes. “He doesn’ give ya the books ‘cause ya ripped the pages last time.” 

“I need ‘em fer studyin’!” Naka protests, and discreetly shoves a balled hand into his pocket. 

“Wha’s that?” Miyuki’s eyes narrow at his now bulging pocket. 

“Stuff!” Naka’s smiles widely, grey eyes sparkling, and she knows he stole something again. He starts off for the main road. “I’ma go see if Kumiko-obaa made daifuku!”

It’s a lost cause. Naka’s never going to leave Takahiro’s house without stealing something because he’s got some kind of weird grudge against the old doctor and Takahiro’s going to hunt him down later because Naka’s the only kid audacious enough to steal from the island’s only doctor. 

“Daifuku! Daifuku!” Tetsu cheers, and they hurry along behind Naka. 

All the shops are lined up along the main street, and Kumiko owns the only mochi shop in town. She’s got a soft spot for kids, so a lot of the kids on the island usually hang around her shop sneaking pieces of mochi. 

“Hi Kumiko-baa!” Naka doesn’t bother waiting for a response as he darts around the old lady and into the shop to examine the freshly made mochi. Miyuki despairs at his manners. 

Kumiko is nice though, so she laughs indulgently, and turns to Miyuki, who bows and greets her accordingly. Tetsu copies her, bowing clumsily. 

“My! Tetsu-chan, ya get bigger e’ry time I see ya! And Miyu-chan!” Kumiko smiles upon seeing them, eyes crinkling warmly, and pats her cheek. “Yer new sibling here yet?”

Miyuki smiles and nods. It’s an honest smile and not just born out of politeness--Kumiko’s one of the only shop owners she responds to genuinely because she cares about everyone on the island and doesn’t ask just for gossip. “It’s a girl, Miho.” 

“How lovely!” The worn sleeves of Kumiko’s kimono slide towards her elbows as she claps her hands together. One of the ladies eavesdropping next to Kumiko nods in agreement and approval. 

“A good, pure name fer a Shuugetsu child,” another nosy lady adds, eyes darting briefly towards where Naka is still hunched over, sifting through different colored daifuku. 

Miyuki scowls at the subtle jab towards her brother, the only one of the Hajime siblings with a name separate from Shuugetsu island’s naming traditions. Their island is proud and makes no room for difference. The Hajime kids are already different enough, with their forehead markings and strange hairline. Naka’s name is a squid in a sea of octopus. 

Kumiko notices it too, and her smile turns brittle. “Intolerance is rather ugly, isn’ it, Mizue-chan? A little somethin’ here and there makes for a livelier island.” 

Kumiko is well in her eighties and is widely respected throughout the island, and Mizue, a young mother in her twenties, has no choice but to take the scolding. She drops her gaze to the side in shame and anger. “Yes, Kumiko-san.” 

“Tetsu!” Mizue calls for her son impatiently, eager to escape, and as if to drive Kumiko’s words even deeper, five separate heads turn towards her. Miyuki’s own brother startles and tilts his head. 

There’s so many boys named Tetsu on the island that you kind of have to differentiate them by last name or you’re not gonna get the Tetsu you want. 

The trend stems from Imamura Tetsuki, the only famous person to come from their island in the past hundred years, and he’d only been part of the exalted Seven Swordsmen, wielding Samehada, for two weeks before he was murdered by someone trying to take his place. Still, two weeks of fame was enough for the islanders. Amemiya Tetsu, the baker’s son, had made it as a big shot merchant, and everyone wants their kid to be the next Tetsu. 

Mizue’s Tetsu trots to his mom’s side, mouth sticky with dango, and she quickly ushers him away, offering a compulsory bow to Kumiko before hightailing it out of there. 

The sun is starting to set, soft pink gold casting shadows over Miyuki’s face. Kumiko wraps some strawberry daifuku, a rarity because of the fruit, and shoves it into Miyuki’s free hand with a wink. 

“Oh no, it’s fine--” Miyuki tries to protest, because Naka’s already eaten half the daifuku in the store, and she’s not trying to rob Kumiko, but the old woman cuts her off.

“I’ll get mad if ya don’ take it,” she insists, pressing Miyuki’s hand down on the bundle, “share with yer family, a’righ’?”

“Thank ya very much, Kumiko-obaa-san.” Miyuki bows deeply, speaking in keigo to express her full gratitude to the gentle shop owner, who’d defended them earlier. Respect is powerful, after all. 

“Such a good child.” Kumiko pats Miyuki’s face again, calloused hands warm and steady against her cheek. 

“We’re goin’, Naka!” Naka stops decimating some other kids in a game of bloody knuckles at Miyuki’s call and shouts his goodbyes. 

“Ya always win,” one of them complains, “’S no fair!” 

“Jus’ get stronger bones, then,” Naka says cheekily, and darts away before the older kid can pull him into a headlock. 

Tetsu gets tired on the way back, footsteps dragging, so Miyuki gives him a piggyback the rest of the way home as Naka runs ahead of them, somehow still full of energy, pulling at flowers on the roadside. 

Her legs are stiff and aching when she gets home, but the scent of sukiyaki makes her perk up. Beef is expensive and has to be imported, so they rarely eat it, but her grandpa, Makoto, had stopped by for beef at the market after work, so they’re feasting tonight. 

The daifuku is sweet, melting in her mouth, and her grandpa wraps some sea urchin in a storage scroll so Miyuki can take it to Kumiko the next day. 

Airo lets Naka and Miyuki hold Miho for a bit after dinner and a bath, so Naka goes to bed, sated for once, and Tetsu’s already asleep, so Miyuki has some rare time to herself before she has to head to bed as well. 

She goes over a map of the Land of Water under the dim moonlight, finger tracing the tiny spot where their island appears. It’s one of her favorite things to do; her island’s spot settles in her heart like a compass, and she wonders about the other islands, wondering about this world. 

Shuugetsu-jima is northwest of the mainland, Kirigakure, nearing the Land of Whirlpools. It’s kinda stuck in a weird triangle between the Land of Fire, the Land of Lightning, and the Land of Water. They trade a lot with the Uzumaki clan and occasionally with the other two countries, so Shuugetsu is more self-sufficient than other islands closer to Kirigakure. 

It’s not a bad thing, she supposes, since most islands have to hire Kiri-nin for protection against pirates and other potential looters, but Kiri-nin can be crueler than high tides on a starless sea. Shuugetsu’s connections with the Land of Whirlpools means heavily seal-enforced ships and more options, so they interact less with the mainland. 

She doesn’t know much about seals yet, but they’re super useful, from what she’s seen of them, and it’s a shame the rest of the Land of Water doesn’t use them more often. Typhoons are common for Kiri islands, and Shuugetsu’s avoided heavy damage partly because Uzushio has seals specifically crafted for typhoons. 

The sound of bare feet on wooden floorboard floats near her and she quietly rolls up the map, recognizing the soft footsteps of her mom. Miho is resting in the bedroom, but she’ll most likely wake up in the middle of the night, crying. Only Airo and Miyuki are awake, and the silence in the house feels like warm sand under bare toes. 

Airo soundlessly settles down next to her in an elegant seiza position. Dutifully, she pulls the rubber holding her side braid out and turns so that her back is facing Airo, dark hair spilling just a bit past her shoulders.

Neither of them say anything, and Airo silently runs a brush through her hair, fingers like whispers against her scalp, sweeping her hair neatly behind her neck. 

Brushing hair is a ritual for Airo and her children, once in the morning and once at night. One for the moon to rest and one for the moon to rise, she always tells them, a braid on both sides for the full moon and a small semi-ponytail on the side for the crescent moons. 

“There,” Airo finally says, smiling faintly. The sharp features of her face are smudged in the night shadows, and she looks even more tired, muted. Miyuki wants to know what makes her happy, what makes her want to smile with her teeth. 

She thanks her mom, squeezing her hand, because it’s the only way she knows how to hug her. Airo softly sweeps aside Miyuki’s bangs, brushing the tips of her fingers over the red marks usually hidden on Miyuki’s forehead like a kiss. The matching red marks on Airo’s forehead are covered by a bandanna, and she wonders what it would feel like, to not always have to choke down a part of who you are. With her forehead bare like this, pieces of moonlight dotting her skin; like she’s stripped to the bone. 


	2. two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> obligatory training/hating on the gov chapter

She would’ve lived the rest of her life on this island. Except, except--

She looks back on this day much later in her life, when she’s neck-deep in a revolution that she somehow finds herself in, and maybe, it all started from here: she's walking into the room to feed her baby sister, who's lying on her back on a futon and actually waiting calmly for one of her many mealtimes. 

Miho is a baby with a terrible temper, even worse than Naka was, because Naka at least listens to reason and Miho hates reason. But right now, Miho’s not screaming her lungs and subsequently everyone’s eardrums out, and Miyuki smiles inadvertently at the way her sister babbles at the ceiling. She’s crossing the threshold when something moves in the corner of her eye. 

And that's when she sees it. The rat. 

Rats are common in most places because they refuse to die and keep spawning and so it goes without saying that she's seen her fair share of rats around. 

But this rat. This rat has looked god in the eyes and said "fuck you" because it hears her coming and instead of darting away like most do, it turns to look at her. 

They make eye contact--one trash bastard to one six year old--and clearly she doesn't pose enough of a threat because the rat makes its move. 

It shoots toward her sister, intent on taking a bite out of the closest appendage to it, which happens to be her ear, and Miyuki _lunges_. At this point her body and thought process is just a mess of nerves and reflexes going "killitkillitkillit" and the next thing she knows she's standing over the corpse of a rat impaled on something smooth and sharp and white. 

It takes her a few seconds to realize that the thing is actually a long piece of bone, with bits of flesh still clinging to it, and instinctively--and she really doesn't know why she does--she looks down at her forearm, to where she sees a huge gaping hole starting to seal itself over, and thinks, oh fuck. 

The skin on her arm is unmarred and she isn’t missing any bones, and it’s like nothing ever happened, but her fingers are cold and her heart is pounding in her chest to the rush in her veins. 

Panic and horror set in like the winter sea, her eyes still fixed on the sight in front of her, and abruptly she remembers that Miho is still lying there, mere inches away from the corpse. 

That spurs her to action and she snatches Miho up from the futon, cradling her in her arms. Miho’s eyes are wide and she blinks at Miyuki’s face, making quiet noises. 

Miyuki is most decidedly freaking out, but she can’t afford to do that right now. It’s fine, she can do this. Just compartmentalize. She focuses on moving Miho to another room and shoves down everything she’s feeling, leaving the room and choosing to ignore the dead rat until things have settled down a bit more. 

She really can’t deal with being indoors right now, so she settles on a small stool outside, under the shade of a tree, and watches a snake bask on a nearby rock as she feeds her sister. 

Some time passes, though she doesn’t really know how much because she isn’t really thinking of anything in particular, and she startles slightly when Airo suddenly appears in front of her. 

Since Miho’s done eating, she starts to hand her back to her mom, but Airo doesn’t take her. Instead, she kneels down and grabs her shoulders, fingers pressing down roughly on her flesh. “There’s a dead rat in the room.” Her voice is low, urgent.

“Oh,” Miyuki says dumbly. Right. The rat. 

Airo’s face is bone-white. “Who killed it?” 

“Me,” Miyuki replies, feeling small. She looks down at the ground, strangely unable to meet her mom’s eyes.

“ _No_ ,” Airo breathes, releasing Miyuki’s shoulders and sinking down onto the ground. “It can’t be.” 

Before Miyuki can even say anything, or ask if she’s okay, she suddenly surges onto her feet and pulls Miyuki up. Airo bends down, and puts her hands on Miyuki’s cheeks, trembling. “Don’t tell _anyone_ about this, you hear me?” She waits for Miyuki to nod before continuing. “What you just did is dangerous, and it must be kept secret.” She inhales deeply and lets go of Miyuki, fists balling by her sides. 

“I’m going to go clean it up. Go put Miho down, it’s time for her nap. After that, go wait for me in my room. Okay?” 

Miyuki nods mutely and goes to follow her instructions, confused and terrified. Why is her mom so scared? What’s going on?

She sits on the floor of her mom’s room, legs crossed. Naka and Tetsu are out playing with a few of their neighbor’s kids and won’t be back any time soon. She can’t tell if she’s lucky that they didn’t see any of this, or unlucky. 

Finally, Airo appears, and shuts the door tightly behind her, locking it. She settles into seiza in front of Miyuki and Miyuki quickly adjusts herself that she’s also sitting in seiza. 

“You can’t tell any of your siblings about this. What I’m telling you now is very dangerous, and if the wrong people find out, we could be killed. Understand?” Airo’s dark eyes are deeper than shadows in water, and Miyuki feels herself shiver.

“I understand,” she says, and pinches her leg, nervous. 

Airo nods acceptance and takes a breath. “The Kaguya clan is a clan descended from Kaguya Ootsutsuki. The one from the legends. And I am from that clan, which means that you have Kaguya blood in you as well.”

Miyuki suddenly realizes that her mouth is slightly open and quickly closes it, listening intently. Airo continues, expression darkening.

“The Kaguya clan is, well, they’re vicious. They don’t like outsiders and they don’t like to lose. Power is everything to them. And their bodies are stronger than average, because they have stronger bones, so they fight with their bodies and not their minds.”

Airo reaches forward and takes Miyuki’s hand. “You know that we’re different. Our hair, the marks on our face, the customs that I still follow.” Miyuki nods, thinking of her long bangs that cover the red dots above her eyebrows, the hairstyles that none of the other island kids have. 

“We must continue to hide what makes us Kaguya. If someone from the Kaguya clan were to hear of us, we would be hunted down and killed. Do you know how I came to this island?” Airo doesn’t wait for Miyuki to respond and plows on. “I was injured in battle, and I was tired of the endless fights. Pointless, empty fights started for no other reason than for the Kaguya to prove their superiority. I wanted to escape, so I let them think I died in battle, and I came here to hide. Your father found me and helped me. But if the Kaguya find out I still live, they will kill me and all of my children. They don’t tolerate those who refuse to fight.” 

At this, Airo looks straight into Miyuki’s eyes. “Even worse, you’ve inherited the clan’s kekkei genkai.”

“Wha’?” Miyuki blinks, trying to wrap her head around the unfamiliar words. “Kekkei what?”

“Kekkei genkai. It’s a technique inherited through blood, those who are born into a certain clan may be born with that clan’s special technique. The Kaguya clan’s kekkei genkai is dangerous, feared by even clan members. The Shikotsumyaku.” 

“’S that wha’ killed the rat?”

“Yes. It’s rarely inherited by clan members, but its power is unbeatable. It allows you to turn your bones into weapons. If you had been born in the clan, you would have been locked up.” 

Miyuki grimaces involuntarily. Locked up? Using your bones? That sounds fucking disgusting and painful. But it hadn’t been painful when she’d killed the rat, had it? She hadn’t even felt it. There’d been a hole in her arm and she hadn’t even felt it. 

“I myself know little about the technique, only the clan leader and our clan’s books have information on it. Perhaps it’s for the best, though. I would rather you never use it again. The technique is obvious when used and others will fear you.” 

“Bu’ I can’t control it.” 

Airo sighs, resigned, and lets go of Miyuki’s hand, pressing her hands to her forehead. “You must learn, then. I can help you learn to control your chakra. But I won’t be able to help you with the Shikotsumyaku.” 

Miyuki wants to say she can’t do it. She wants to close her eyes and go back in time so that this never happened. How the hell is she supposed to figure out whatever this kekkei genkai is by herself? She barely knows anything about chakra. 

But she can’t say that. She can’t give up because giving up would be giving up on her family, and she loves them too much for that. If she wants to protect them, she’ll have to learn. 

Her mom takes her silence as assent. “I will always do whatever I can to protect you. But there will be times I’ll be unable to teach you in secret, so you must find others who can help you. Hirako Natsue is the strongest on the island. She might teach you if you ask her.” 

Miyuki’s heard of Hirako Natsue. One-armed Hirako, they call her. From the rumors, she’d been one of the top contenders for a place in the Seven Swordsmen, but after a major injury, had been forced to retire and ended up on Shuugetsu, looking for a quiet place to stay. 

“Okay. But wha’ abou’ Naka and Tetsu?”

“They have no need to know of our heritage right now. They’re still young, and I don't want them to live in fear. You _cannot_ tell them.” Airo looks at her face beseechingly, and Miyuki nods again. 

“Thank you,” her mom lets out a long breath, looking once again weary. Her appearance is young, but she’s always moved like she’s being weighed down. Always quiet, shoulders curved tiredly. 

Miyuki wishes she could take some of that burden, some of that unhappiness. She kind of understands now, where it comes from. Airo’s heaviness, her desire for a family, her stilted way of love.

She wants to hug her, say _I love you_ , but the words are stuck in her throat, half formed in her lungs, and maybe, she won’t ever know how to say it to her mom; maybe her mom will never learn how to say it back. But love is more than words, so she says thank you instead. 

Airo rests a hand on her head before getting up to check on Miho and start preparing dinner. 

So Miyuki just sits there for a bit more, because things have changed now, her whole world tilted on its edge. She’s not just some strange-looking fisherman’s daughter on a small island anymore. But a lot of things make sense now, like why Tetsu chews rocks, or why Naka can fall off the roof of their house and come out unscathed.

It’s scary, all these unknowns, all these secrets. It’s strange, stranger than most things that she’s seen in this short lifetime, but she’s always known this world is weird as hell, so it’s just another pill to swallow. She has no choice, anyway, if she wants her family to keep living peaceful lives. 

Well. This is her life now. So she gets up, and moves on. It’s just another problem to solve and she’ll deal with everything else that comes with it. 

And things are already different.

  
  


That night, they’re eating dinner as usual, fish and rice and side dishes. But she eats more fish than usual, teeth tearing through the anchovies, trying to sate the hunger as deep as her marrow. She gulps down two glasses of milk too, before she sets down her chopsticks. 

When she finally looks up, her grandpa is staring at her, amused and a little weirded out. “Hungry today, Miyu-chan?” 

She shrugs awkwardly, unable to explain the gripping need, the feeling of delicate fish bones crunching in her mouth, the milk settling into her bones. Even thinking about it makes her feel like she’s lost it. 

Makoto lets out a boom of a laugh, “Yer growin’ up! Eat more an’ grow up strong.” He places some more fish on her plate. Miyuki’s full, but she eats it anyway.

“Father, it isn’ good fer young girls ta eat so much,” Kazuo frowns. What a little bitch, Miyuki thinks, and reaches for another piece of fish out of spite. 

“Miyu-chan’s still growin’, an’ some meat’ll do her good.” Makoto grins widely and adds more fish to Naka’s plate too. “Yer gonna need ta eat more if ya wanna catch up with yer sister.” 

Naka shoves the fish in his mouth greedily, even though he already eats the most out of all the kids. “’A course! I’ma be the biggest!” Bits of half-chewed fish fly from his mouth. 

Airo pauses from deboning Tetsu’s fish meat to wipe at the table with a napkin. Her gaze lands on Miyuki, knowing, and says nothing as she places a piece of nanohana on Tetsu’s plate. They usually eat vegetables harvested from mountains, since they’re easy to grow and access, and Airo had cooked nanohana for tonight’s dinner. Tetsu, like Miyuki, hates vegetables though, so he refuses to eat it, even after Airo’s prodding.

Seeing an escape in Naka, Tetsu picks up the vegetable with his bare hands and lobs it onto Naka’s plate. And since Naka will literally eat whatever’s on his plate, he eats it, ignoring the fact that it came from Tetsu’s slobbery baby hands. 

Airo gives up and goes to fuss over Miho, because the daily Tetsu versus vegetables fight has an 80 percent win rate in Tetsu’s favor and he’s already eaten two pieces of vegetable she sneaked in with the fish. 

By the time everyone’s finished eating, there’s food crumbs all over the side of the table where the kids sit. Even Miyuki’s area has bits of rice and fish, but that’s only because Naka’s spray range is ungodly. 

She goes to the sink to help wash the dishes and ropes Naka into drying them. Every time Naka rinses the dishes, he ends up getting more water on the counter than on the dishes, so no one really lets him do the washing part anymore. 

“Say,” she says to Naka, deliberately casual, “do ya wanna learn how ta use chakra?” 

“Huh?” He stops rubbing furiously at a single spot with the dishcloth and looks at her. “Chakra? Like fer ninja?”

“Yeah, I heard Hirako-san’s super strong.” 

The thing is, Naka’s always wanted to be the best in everything. He wants to know everything, and likes knowing everything. If she can get him to learn with her, she won’t have to learn alone and she can keep an eye on him at the same time, because he always gets into trouble when she’s not watching. 

Just today, he’d stolen and eaten from the Moriyama’s strawberry fields again, and he’d gotten caught after getting a bunch of other kids in on it. Plus, it’ll keep him from getting suspicious about her suddenly being able to use chakra. It’ll be killing three birds with one stone. 

“Hirako-san? Isn’ she that angry sword lady wit’ one arm?” 

“She woulda been parta the Seven Swordsmen, dummy. Don’ be rude.” 

“Seven Swordsmen?” Naka accidentally elbows her in the side in his flailing excitement. She elbows him back, just for the principle of it. “Let’s get her ta teach us tomorrow!” 

Miyuki smothers a grin. Hook, line, and sinker. “Ya better wait fer me this time.”

“I will, I will,” he draws out the words in a whine, and she flicks the dishcloth into his face, laughing while he splutters. 

* * *

Miyuki’s been training secretly with Airo for two years now. Airo hasn’t been able to train her recently, though, since her newest brother, Haruto, was just born, but Miyuki’s pretty good at practicing on her own. Chakra hadn’t been a difficult concept for her to grasp, since it’s basically life energy, but using it in theory and practice are two very different things. For one, controlling it’s a pain in the ass, because you only need very specific amounts for each technique you do. It’s dividing and finding those amounts that’s harder to get a handle on. 

And to add insult to injury, her chakra reserves are still small, so she can’t even practice that much without feeling like a sea slug left out in the sun to dry. But she’s made decent progress with Shikotsumyaku, and she can control the growth and strength of the major bones in her body.

To use Shikotsumyaku, though, she needs a good understanding of each and every bone in her body and how they work, so she gets Takahiro to lend her his anatomy books. The good thing is that he trusts her significantly more than he trusts Naka with his books, so she gets to borrow them for unlimited periods. 

She’s starting to understand how it works now, but the only time she can practice is at night, so that stops her from trying more showy skills since they take up a lot of space. 

Naka, though, is thriving. His chakra reserves are crazy big, and his kenjutsu and basic chakra skills progress at terrifying rates. He likes to gloat about his kenjutsu in front of her, but she ignores him because he can’t walk on water yet, so who’s the real winner here? 

They’d visited crabby Hirako Natsue a few times, with Naka doing most of the badgering and Miyuki doing the bribing, before she’d agreed to teach them. Honestly though, Miyuki gets her bad attitude. Hirako had been one of the best kenjutsu masters in Kiri, but then she’d lost an arm and sliced a few tendons, and she’d lost everything. And now she was far out of the way of battle on a tiny island, where people gossiped and fished all day. 

Still, Hirako teaches them well, and though her words and mannerisms are crass, she’s someone who cares. She’s also insanely powerful, standing at 6’1 in her brown haired, brown eyed, muscled glory. Miyuki’s only seen a fraction of her actual abilities, but she can tell how strong she is. Hirako’s one of those people who have an overwhelming aura, and when you step into her presence, you feel like a fat rabbit caught in the grasp of a snake. 

Miyuki also thinks that she likes having people to teach, likes having a reason to use her skills again. She’s a strict teacher who’s perfected the art of tying troublesome kids to trees with a single hand, and even Naka listens to her without complaint. Kenjutsu’s not her thing though, so she ends up learning things like water walking from Hirako instead. 

Unfortunately, a few other kids catch onto their lessons with Hirako and jump on the opportunity, because everyone and their mother wants to learn from someone who was good enough to be a Seven Swordsman. That lessens a lot of Hirako’s time with them, but she looks a lot happier and satisfied now, and everyone on the island starts calling her Hirako-sensei, so Miyuki doesn’t complain. 

Miyuki and Naka show up to the island’s only school maybe once or twice a week because they’re usually too busy training now. The school’s pretty lenient on attendance though, considering that most kids just stop attending altogether when they turn eleven, even though the school’s supposed to be for kids ages six to sixteen. All the island kids are too busy helping their families farm and fish and watch house to keep going to school, so they just attend whenever they feel like it. After the teacher, Nakamura, had come to the island though, he’d basically threatened the families into sending their kids at least twice a month.

Miyuki’s not a big fan of school, so she’d rather do more hands-on stuff, like training. Besides, they just learn basic math and language skills, and their teacher, Nakamura, is weirdly obsessed with instilling the Land of Water propaganda in their heads. Actually, no one on the island really likes Nakamura, and for good reason. 

The only nice thing is the free books, but they’re communal, so most of the pages either have boogers or food stains on them. Nakamura still hasn’t replaced them because he says the money should go to funding kids who want to be shinobi because he’s a nationalism-blinded asshole. 

Every year, Nakamura tries to manipulate a few kids into going to Kirigakure so they can study at Kiri’s ninja academy, but most kids don’t go because their parents would rather them stay on the island and help out, instead of leaving the island for a pipe dream that can and will get you killed. Becoming one of the Seven Swordsmen is a nice dream and all, but most kids hit reality by the time they’re old enough to help out when salmon and tuna season hit and they realize that money comes from rich people, not killing. 

They sometimes get orders for the Water Daimyou whenever he decides to host parties (which is often) and wants to flex his money by serving heaps of sashimi. Whenever that happens, parents let their kids buy expensive desserts like cake for a few weeks, because living on the pockets of rich people is nice when they’re not taxing and working the hair from your head and stealing from everyone. 

Still, there’re a few dreamers who do end up leaving the island for Kirigakure, and not a single one of them has returned. Rumors of the Academy’s bloody graduation ritual has spread through all the scattered islands, and if that isn’t a big enough deterrent, she doesn’t know what is. 

It’s also for this reason that most of the adults on the island hate Nakamura, and whenever one of the kids come home spouting his militaristic ideologies, his house ends up losing a few pieces. Last time, someone stole his door, and everyone pretended that it was the wind that blew the door away when he asked about it. 

They can’t exactly kick him out, though, since the Daimyou recently implemented a new education program for the islands farther out, declaring them to be “too independent” and stating that they need to assimilate more with the mainland. Honestly, the greedy Daimyou wouldn’t have given a flying fuck about the islands further out like Shuugetsu, so it was probably some piece of shit on his council who decided that the outer islands were getting too self-sufficient and needed a healthy dose of nationalism. 

Nakamura was sent to their island as a part of that program, and his role as a teacher is just a glorified cover for a spy, but they don’t dare kick him out in fear of Water authorities retaliating with harsher measures. 

Right now, though, Nakamura can’t really do much other than try to influence the younger generations into becoming child soldiers and force everyone in his class to start speaking in the Kiri standard dialect. He uses corporal punishment and tells them they sound uneducated when any of them start slipping into Shuugetsu’s dialect, which makes Miyuki want to punch him in the face and makes kids like Naka hide venomous snakes in his desk. 

Still, to Miyuki, learning the Kiri dialect is useful, because people who want to leave the island for better jobs or find people from wealthy families to trade with need to know the dialect, since the Shuugetsu dialect is nearly mutually intelligible from years of geographic isolation. 

She’s concluded, though, that the Daimyou’s greed is the root of corruption in the Land of Water, especially since he turns a blind eye to stealing nobles, as long as they continue to support his regime.

Most people on the island are old enough to remember the Second Shinobi War, too, and that just makes them hate the Daimyou even more. One of the catchphrases on the island is “It would be nice if this typhoon tears apart the Daimyou’s palace wouldn’t it?” whenever a typhoon passes by.

The Water Daimyou values winning wars over the actual welfare of the people, and he uses Kiri’s military to win the petty fights that he starts. From what she’s heard, Kirigakure isn’t a pretty place to be, and the people who survive it have forgotten how to have hearts. The gossip on the Third Mizukage is limited, but anyone who lets Kiri continue to rot from the inside can’t be doing that great. 

The war devastated many islands, as the islands around the mainland are close to many other countries and were usually used as places for shinobi to fight in or infiltrate into other countries. It also fucked up the Land of Water’s economy, since a lot of resources were poured into fighting a long war, and no one thought to send funds to the small outer islands after the war was over. 

Shuugetsu is doing better now, especially since they’ve expanded trade with other countries and have opened to tourism, which reaches its peak during the summer when nobles and wealthy merchant families want a nice beach vacation. They’ve got nice weather, sunny beaches, cool animals, and good food. 

They’re not that different from some of the other outer islands, but all of them have been milking tourism for everything it has. Shuugetsu in particular likes to advertise their mochi and a chance to interact with cool sea animals on the beach. 

It’s because that everyone’s living relatively peaceful lives that the older generations don’t care about the state of things in the country, because that’s how it’s always been. They bite their tongues and keep their heads down, even though they know things aren’t getting better. 

But things can’t stay the same forever, Miyuki knows, not when things will get worse from here. Change comes with the eastern wind, the island elders always say, the sea waits for no one. 

And change indeed, barrels through her life, tearing everything into pieces like a ship caught in a whirlpool. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> listen,, that rat story is real. this whole chap was written bc my grandpa told me about how a rat bit off his neighbor's ear when he was little and i live in Fear of those trash bastards


	3. three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idk how the academy/transportation btw islands work so it be like that

In a twist of fate, it’s Naka that’s the tide that spurs the whirlpool. 

The day before Naka runs away, one of her molars has just fallen out, and she gives the baby tooth to Airo, who places it in a box where she’s collecting all of their baby teeth. 

She’s ten now, and Miho and Haruto are at that age where they cling to her like koalas. Tetsu’s decided that he’s too old for that now, and follows in Naka’s footsteps by constantly bothering Takahiro and taking his books. 

The only difference is that Tetsu doesn’t just want to learn about what’s in his books, he wants to learn everything that the island’s doctor does. He’s started to spend all of his time in Takahiro’s house, and she’s pretty sure that at this rate, Takahiro’s going to take him as his apprentice in a year or two. 

It feels weird, because Tetsu’s growing up. He’s still young, of course, but now that he’s always at Takahiro’s, she kind of misses seeing him follow her around all the time. 

And then there’s Naka, who’s always been pretty independent. 

She’s learned new things about Naka too, like how he prefers being called they, and that they suddenly want to be a ninja. 

They’ve never really mentioned wanting to be a ninja before, even though they’re the strongest of the kids on the island; she’d thought that they’d been satisfied with the state of things. 

But in true Naka fashion, they’d suddenly mentioned wanting to leave the island and going to Kiri’s academy during breakfast that morning, and Airo had lost her shit. 

It’d been the first time she’d seen Airo yell that loudly and for that long, and she’d thanked all the stars in the sky that Makoto and Kazuo had already left early in the morning to get a good spot for their boat. 

Airo had let a few things slip, in her anger, and now Tetsu and Naka know about their heritage from the Kaguya clan. That should’ve been the end of it--Airo didn’t want Naka to leave the island and get killed, and Naka would have to wait until they turned fifteen, and if they still wanted to be a ninja, she’d let them go. 

Except, Naka had started yelling back, too. Things about why only their hair was red, why Kazuo always treated them so coldly, why people always muttered about their name. 

Airo had paled, much like the first time she’d seen Miyuki use Shikotsumyaku, and that’s when she’d said it. Uzumaki. Naka was half Uzumaki, and they were the child of Airo’s cousin, who’d been killed for trying to run and having a child with an outsider. Before he’d died, he’d found Airo and asked her to take care of Naka; named by their Uzumaki mother who’d died during childbirth. 

It doesn’t matter, she’d told them, you’re still my child. But Naka had gone silent at her admission and had walked out, slamming the door shut.

The silence had hurt, but Naka was hurting more than the rest of them, so she’d left them alone, and waited for them to cool off. 

Now she’s looking for them near the shore, where there’s a lot of thick greenery, which makes it a good place to go when you want to be alone. 

The sand seeps into her shoes as she walks, so she takes them off, feeling the hot press of sand against her feet. She tongues the hole in her mouth where her molar had been, tasting blood. 

It’s a surprisingly quiet afternoon--it’s early summer but there’s only a few people scattered on the beaches. They’re all smudges from where she’s standing, but she can hear faint echoes of laughter. 

Naka is nowhere to be found, so she decides to test her chakra sensing abilities, closing her eyes. She sweeps over the area, reaching out with her chakra, until she brushes past a bonfire of chakra, bright and blazing. She recognizes it immediately. 

They haven’t moved an inch from their spot when she finally sees them, pushing past a few nagging tree branches. 

“Hey,” she says, and brushes some ants away before settling down next to them, leaning against the tree trunk. 

They don’t look at her and stay silent, fingers clenched in the worn hem of their lavender yukata. The yukata has a few tears in it from training, and it’s starting to get short on them. 

Miyuki busies herself with flicking away all the bugs that try to get near her while she waits for Naka to talk. A few persistent flying ones keep coming back, so she grabs a thick, sturdy leaf near her and whacks them with it. 

“I already knew,” she hears them say, interrupting her flapping. She sets the leaf down and turns to look at them. 

“I knew that I wasn’ dad’s.” Naka tears a leaf apart with their hands as they talk. “’M not dumb, I got red hair. An’ my name’s different. I jus’ didn’ think I wasn’ even mom’s.”

Oh. She didn’t know it’d hurt them this much, didn’t know that they’d noticed. They’d never acted like they knew something was up, but then again, Kazuo treated them so awkwardly that it was hard not to notice. 

Her heart aches. She leans over and pulls them into a tight hug, pressing her face into their long, tangled hair. 

“I don’ care,” she says fiercely, “We’re yer family an’ we love ya. An’ yer an Uzumaki, how cool is that? Ya get a whole other clan a’ people who’ll love ya and teach ya.” 

Their arms tighten around her as they start to cry, loud, gasping sobs, soaking the thin material of her shirt. They’re so small in her arms, she thinks, so young. 

Slowly, their sobs slow to sniffles, and they pull away, rubbing furiously at their eyes.

“I’ma do it,” they tell her, eyes puffy and red, but unwavering in their determination. “Bein’ a ninja.” 

“Why?” They’ve never shown a particular interest in anything, just a general need to be good at everything. And with their skills in manipulating their unfairly large chakra reserves and their ability to pick up new concepts quickly, they were already one of the best on the island.

“Ninja are strong, so they get ta do what they want. I can go ta the Land a’ Whirlpools if I become a ninja.” 

Miyuki blinks at Naka’s earnesty, their straightforward logic. It’s true that generally citizens of the Land of Water don’t have much freedom to go to different countries if they don’t have trading permits or the right travel documents, which are hellish to get, and also unreasonably expensive. 

The main problem is that too many people have tried to leave because the state of the country’s economy is so poor, so the Daimyou is trying to control the emigration from the country. So unless you can bribe the border control, leaving for another country with the possibility of selling information about the Land of Water, is generally not possible for average island residents. 

And if people find out Naka’s half-Uzumaki, they’d send hunter-nin after them, since the abilities of an Uzumaki are highly coveted, and Kiri would murder to get their hands on a Water born Uzumaki. 

So by becoming a ninja, you have the abilities to get out of the country undetected or you have the power or clearance to leave the country. In Kirigakure, power is everything, and if you can stand at the top, you can make others bend to your will. 

She gets it, she really does. But still. “Mom’s not gonna be happy ‘bout that.” Airo would definitely not want Naka risking their identity as an Uzumaki and Kaguya at the academy. 

Naka shakes their head and grips her arm, leaning in. “Bein’ Uzumaki, it’s parta me.” They look her in the eyes, as if willing her to see the want and hope swirling in them. How they’d always wanted someone to be like them, with the same kind of name, chakra, and hair. How they’d always wanted someone to help them understand the things that made them so different here. “I need ta go.” 

“Can’t ya jus’ wait a few more years? You’ll be stronger, too. Ya know, Kiri’s bloody graduation? You’ll hafta kill.” She can’t budge on this. She’d rather have them be alive than beaten down by Kiri’s violence, life stolen the way that kids there are born into blood. 

Naka’s face goes blank, and they look away. It hurts her a bit, to crush them like this, but being an older sibling means being a protector. “Fine.” 

She frowns, because she knows them, and they never give up that easily. But she lets it go, hoping that they’ll put it out of their mind, at least for a while. 

She should’ve seen it coming, when she wakes up the next morning and they’re gone. 

* * *

“Tha’ fuckin’ idiot,” she mutters under her breath, tugging on her shoes and shoving a bunch of essentials into a bag. 

They’ve run off, and three guesses it’s Kirigakure. 

Airo’s at her wit’s end, hair uncombed and feet pacing indents into the floor. “Come right back once you find Naka, okay?” She’s twisting her hands, nails pressing into her skin. 

Miyuki nods, “Don’ worry. I’ll find ‘em.” 

Tetsu’s hovering by her side, handing her things he deems important for an impromptu road trip, which is basically a comb, some dried fruit, and bandages. Miyuki huffs a laugh and lets him put them in her bag, patting his head. 

“Thanks, Tetsu.” She gently moves his hand away so he can’t shove more dried strawberries into her bag. 

“Naka-nii likes strawberries,” he tells her seriously, like bringing more dried strawberries will lure Naka home like a stray cat. 

“Ya already gave ‘em ta me, see?” Tilting her bag to the side so Tetsu can see, she lets him inspect the insides and he nods, satisfied. 

“I’ll be back wit’ Naka, don’ worry.” She says this to Airo more than she does to Tetsu, and heaves the bag onto her shoulder. 

Airo’s stopped pacing and is standing by the doorway, with Miho and Haruto clinging to her yukata. Miho’s chattering curiously, not completely understanding the situation. 

Miyuki kisses them on their chubby cheeks, smiling a bit when they both plant slobbery kisses on her cheek in return, and says goodbye to them. Tetsu doesn’t like kisses anymore but tolerates one, hugging her tightly around the middle.

She nods at Airo as she leaves and Airo watches her with worried eyes, arms tightly wrapped around the rest of her kids. 

In all honesty, Airo really shouldn’t be trusting a nine year old to go off on their own and look for another kid, but their culture had its roots in pride, and pride could be senseless sometimes. Airo didn’t want outsiders involved in her affairs, and it was something she trusted Miyuki to take care of. 

Still, Miyuki wasn’t mentally an actual nine year old, so she wasn’t going to complain, and since she spent most of her time with Naka and knew them better than anyone else who would’ve been sent after them. 

She and Airo’d agreed on not telling Kazuo and Makoto the truth. Airo and Kazuo’s relationship is rather complicated, and Kazuo’s never known how to deal with Naka. So as far as they know, Miyuki and Naka are out somewhere on the island as usual, and will be back before the end of the day. 

She heads off to the eastern docks, hoping to catch a ride with one of the trading boats leaving for the mainland. Naka had most likely gotten a ride with one of the fishing or trading boats that leave very early in the morning, but they shouldn’t be too far ahead. 

“Hey,” she says to one of the people who don’t look too busy by the docks. “Any a’ them leavin’ for Kiri?”

The man blinks and looks down at her, squinting through the sun’s glare. A ragged straw hat dangles lopsidedly from his head. “Kiri? Tha’ shithole? Nah, but Muroi-jii’s goin’ out ta Otsuumi’s shrine. His kid’s testin’ fer a position at the Daimyou’s court, ya know?” He snorts wryly, “Like prayin’s gonna do shit fer the poor boy. Those nobles’re gonna eat ‘im alive.” 

Like anyone on Shuugetsu, he overshares when answering simple questions and adds his opinion to everything he says. Did she ask for Muroi’s life story? No, but she’s getting it anyway. 

Otsuumi’s a small island nearing Kiri, and her chakra reserves should be large enough for her to water run to Kiri from there. As long as she runs in the right direction, it should take her fifteen minutes max. From there, she’ll hopefully be able to sneak on the island, since the border guards will definitely find a little kid running on the water suspicious. 

“Righ’,” she says, “thanks. That his ship o’er there?” She points to a smaller boat a few feet away, bobbing gently. It’s smaller than the other ships and looks like one for personal use too, so it should be Muroi’s. 

“Tha’s righ’.” The man scratches at his unkempt beard and frowns lazily at her. “Don’ tell me ya wanna go ta Kiri’s academy. Lil’ brat like ya should be stayin’ home.” 

She hears the unspoken under his derisive tone, little girls should be safe at home and not out on an adventure. 

She doesn’t care. All these years of living under men who think they know better than her, who think they can tell her what to do, they slide off like water off a duck’s back now. There’s nothing to prove to them, and she knows herself well enough to ignore them. “It’s jus’ a visit. Got relatives there. I don’ care ‘bout bein’ a ninja.” 

“Seen this kid earlier this mornin’, red haired an’ girly-lookin’, said he was goin’ ta Kiri fer his relatives too. Ya wouldn’t happen ta be visitin’ the same relatives, would ya?” Suspicion laces his tone and he crosses his arms, trying to intimidate her with his size. 

She looks up with pleading eyes, shrugging innocently and kicking at the dirt with her feet, shoulders hunched in and trying to look as small as possible. “I really jus’ wanna go fer a visit.” 

Most of the adult islanders have soft spots for kids--which really mostly stems from the Land of Water’s violent history--and she’s not ashamed of exploiting that. 

The man loosens his stance and lets out a breath. “Well, none a’ my business anyway. Ya kids don’ be runnin’ ta yer deaths, ya hear?” 

Miyuki nods, “I won’t.” He’s a middle-aged man, and definitely old enough to have lived through the Second Shinobi War. It’s no wonder he’s cautious against kids running off to Kiri, he’s probably known enough kids who never came back from the war. 

“C’mon, I’ll take ya to Kuroi-jii. We’re ol’ buddies.” He motions with his head and she dutifully follows behind him, running a little to catch up to his pace. 

“Thanks, ojii-san.” 

“Ojii-san?” he splutters, offended. “Do I look like a gramps to ya?” 

“Ya said yer ol’ buddies with Kuroi-jii-san,” she quips lightly. “Don’ that mean yer ol’ too?”

“Damn brat,” he pulls her ear, but not roughly. “Keep this up an’ ya won’t be gettin’ on a boat. The name’s Daizen, ya got it?”

She bats his hand away. “Sure, Daizen-jii-san.” 

Daizen rolls his eyes and lets out a laugh. He flicks a hand in a wave at an old man by the boat she’d pointed out earlier. “Yo, Eiichi. Got ya a brat who wants ta come along.” 

“Ta Otsuumi?” Kuroi looks her up and down. “What’s a kid goin’ there fer?”

Before she can say anything, Daizen comes up behind her and claps a hand on her shoulder. “She’s goin’ ta Kiri, an’ Otsuumi’s closest.” 

The two men stare at each other, and she knows there’s some silent conversation going on there, but she doesn’t know them well enough to understand.

Finally, Kuroi sighs and scratches the side of his head, grey hairs sparse but visible. “Fine. C’mon, kid, I’ll take ya ta Kiri.” 

“Oh, it’s fine,” she tries to protest, turning to look at Daizen helplessly, but he makes a shooing motion with his hands and Kuroi tells her to just get onto the boat. 

“Jus’ get on. I’m leavin’ now.” Kuroi makes sure she’s settled down comfortably before going back up to the dock to exchange a few words with Daizen and untie the boat. 

She waves at Daizen as the boat moves away from the shore and he returns it with a lazy quirk of a lip, nodding at her. She’s lucky, she knows, because if it had been a windier day she’d have better luck walking to Kiri from Shuugetsu herself. 

And Daizen had been nice enough to hook her up with a ride, free of charge. She’s going to have to track him and Kuroi down when she returns and gift them some food as customary thanks.

Kuroi seems gruff, but he makes small talk with her to pass the time, since it’s a few hours trip. He tells her about his family, about how he hates the Daimyou, and lets her look at his fishing equipment. 

He’s pretty nice, she thinks, and acts like a pretty typical island elder, full of complaints and tales about the sea. He even tells her about one time he fell into the sea as a kid, but a giant jellyfish surged up from the depths and pushed him up to the surface with the top of its body, the non-stinging parts. 

She expresses the appropriate amount of awe at this tale and he grins at her, happily reminiscing about the past. Giant jellyfish are actually pretty common in the waters, but usually people avoid going in the water because one sting from them could potentially kill a person. 

Still, all the sea animals are sources of pride for the people on the island, and all the kids grow up hearing stories about great sea creatures who, like the sea’s capricious waters, both work with the island and against it. 

The creatures of the sea are to be respected, elders always tell her, we take from their lands and sometimes their lives, so we must show our thanks and respect each and every life. 

She’s never seen one of the animals in person, but she’s heard gossip about how someone wandered too far into a great white’s territory and their boat was destroyed by the shark, or how someone was drowned by a dolphin for offending it. Sometimes, people will bring back the body of a dead sea creature that they killed for survival purposes, and they always hold a ritual then, paying their respects before burying it. 

In the middle of their talk, Kuroi hands her one of the sandwiches he packed for lunch and she takes it gratefully, thanking him before eating. It’s almost lunchtime, and they should be nearing Kiri.

She can feel it in the air, the cool mist melting on her face and clothes, obscuring her vision from the horizon. The mist is also another reason why so few people travel to Kiri--only the most experienced can navigate its waters, since the mist makes practically everything farther than ten feet in front of your face invisible. 

Non-natives and potential invaders travel in circles, lost on the expanse of the sea, never getting near to Kiri. That’s why the island was chosen for the shinobi village, anyway. It’s incredibly hard to find unless you’re from the Land of Water.

Kuroi raises a green flag onto the top of the boat, signalling that they’re from one of the islands for visiting or trading purposes. They’re allowed to dock, and he pats her on the head like all other adults do and gives her a small wooden carving, telling her that it’ll be her ticket off the island. 

She thanks him again, smiling genuinely, and tells him that she wishes the best for his son and his job. 

The best thing about the island is that it’s small, so you know you’ll always meet someone again, and goodbyes aren’t really goodbyes. 

She clambers onto the dock, stating her excuse of visiting a relative to the guard, and he lets her go, clearly thinking nothing of her scruffy appearance and short height. 

Kiri is large, much more modernized than Shuugetsu, and the amount of chakra just hovering on the edges of her senses is dizzying. It’s a little terrifying, going from the tranquility of Shuugetsu to this buzzing tension, the atmosphere tinged with bloodlust.

The guard glances at her still, almost shell-shocked form, and snorts mockingly. “This is why you hicks never last for long. Weak and soft.” 

Miyuki tenses angrily and pointedly doesn’t look at him. She bows, keeping her gaze toward her shoes, fury and anxiety clawing at her chest, and walks away. 

Mainlanders and nobles are always looking down on people like her from small islands, especially since they have accents, but outright arrogance makes her want to hit them and prove them wrong. She loves Shuugetsu, its flaws and all, and she doesn’t let herself hunch over against the stares people are giving her, even though she feels distinctly out of place. 

Mostly everyone on Kiri is pale, since the mist obscures a lot of the sun, and they eye her tan skin, straw sandals, and ratty shorts with suspicion. 

She’s about to suck it up and ask for directions when she feels Naka’s chakra spike further inland. Her sensory abilities aren’t as good as theirs--they can feel strong emotions from people’s chakra and sense small amounts--so she can’t tell if they’re in danger, but she races over to where it came from. 

It’s like a beacon, drawing her in closer and closer until she skids to a stop in front of a large stone building, slightly out of breath. Weathered kanji carved onto the top of the building reads “Kirigakure Academy”. 

Of course Naka headed straight here without considering the consequences. Of course. She can’t even gather the energy to be surprised by anything they do anymore. She just hopes they haven’t officially enrolled yet, because that’ll be a pain in the ass to deal with. 

The building looms over her, colorless and rigid, reminding her of brutalist architecture. It’s intimidating and ugly and she hates it.

But she can feel Naka’s chakra coming from the inside, so she steels herself, walking in and heading towards the front desk, where a receptionist sits, scowling down at his paperwork. 

“Hello,” she greets, feeling self-conscious about her accent and trying to dredge up the sounds of Kiri’s dialect, “Are classes over yet?” 

“You a student?” he grunts, frowning at her. He doesn’t wait for her to respond. “You’re late. Motoki-sensei’ll have your ass.” 

He raises an eyebrow at her when she doesn’t move. “You want double the punishment or what?”

“I’m going, I’m going.” 

Is the security here really this lax? This guy hadn’t even bothered checking if she was actually a student or not. Considering the graduation exam though, the teachers here were definitely more than capable of defending themselves. People probably didn’t really care about the ungraduated kids. 

Naka’s chakra continues to spike at random intervals, and she heads towards it, dodging past a few classrooms with their doors closed.

There’s a kid half-hidden by an open doorway, head sticking into the room she feels Naka’s chakra coming from. 

“What’re you doing?” 

The kid startles and jerks back, turning to stare at her, bright green eyes wide. She’s got wavy red hair, almost as dark as Naka’s, and is short and small in the way her younger siblings are. She’s definitely younger than Miyuki, baby fat clinging to her cheeks and body. 

Miyuki’s always been weak to kids, especially since she’s got four younger siblings. 

“Nothing!” The girl squeaks, flushing red, but then narrows her eyes skeptically when she takes in Miyuki’s full appearance. “Who’re _you_? What’re you doing?”

“I’m just looking for my sibling.” She steps around the girl and peers into the room. 

It’s spacious inside, and she spots Naka fighting with some other kid on what looks like a pool. The other kid’s clearly losing, but still puts up a fight. 

There’s two stories to the room, with stairs near them leading up to a balcony type thing where some other kids are watching the ongoing battle. 

Naka’s eyes flicker over to her for just a second, but they don’t falter, continuing their onslaught of sword strikes. They smash their sword onto the other kid’s, the force of it blowing the kid’s sword out of his hands. 

The kid falters, then quickly starts forming hand signs, but Naka closes in and kicks them in the stomach and onto the other side of the room, out of the pool. The kids on the second level erupt into loud whispers.

The girl, who’s peeking out from behind her, gasps. “That was so cool!” 

Miyuki glances at her. “Aren’t you too young to be in this class?” The other kids look to be about Naka’s age and older. 

“Yeah, so that’s why I’m spying.” She fixes her with an annoyed look and raises a finger to her lips. “Shh!”

“Right. My bad.” 

Naka walks across the water to the dry part of the room, and bows to the only adult, who’s probably the teacher. 

“Hajime wins,” the teacher announces, “and as per the rules, Hajime is to take Okumura’s spot in the class, and Okumura will be demoted to a lower class.” 

Okumura, the kid Naka had fought against, struggles to their feet, visibly wincing. 

“Fucking bullshit!” she screams, dragging herself towards the teacher. “I’m the strongest in this class! You think this girly hick can beat me? He cheated!” 

The teacher is unmoved. “The match was fair, and your kenjutsu skills are nowhere near Hajime’s. Maybe you should reflect on your abilities rather than acting like a spoiled child.”

“Hōzuki-sensei!” Okumura protests, face scrunched in her anger. “I’m not going back to classes with fucking babies!”

“Hey!” The little girl gives Okumura a dirty look. Miyuki slaps a hand over her mouth too late, and the teacher turns to look at them.

“Well,” Hōzuki says dryly, “you can go join your new class right now, Okumura. They’re waiting for you by the door.”

“Oops,” the girl says, and Miyuki wants to lie down on the floor. 

Okumura growls and stomps towards the door. As she passes Naka, she hisses, “You better watch your fucking back.”

Naka doesn’t even flinch. “Loser,” they sneer. 

“Okumura.” Hōzuki’s voice cuts in between them like a blade, stopping them from escalating into another fight.

When Okumura finally leaves the room with a final “Tch”, Hōzuki walks towards them, features fully coming into focus at his proximity. 

He’s tall and lean, surprisingly young, with silky white hair and pupil-less purple eyes. He’s slouching slightly, but instead of coming off as sloppy, he gives off a relaxed air that only comes with confidence in one’s skills. 

As he sighs exasperatedly at the little girl hiding behind Miyuki, she catches a glimpse of sharp, pointed teeth. “Again, Terumi?”

She steps out guiltily from behind Miyuki. “I wanna learn more! I wanna be in this class.” 

Hōzuki shakes his head. “You should finish the basics course first. Back to class with you. Kobashi-sensei’s going to be pissed.” 

Terumi pouts, pretty unfazed at the thought of facing her teacher. “Fine.” She tugs at Miyuki’s sleeve and grins, “See ya, nee-san! I hope you find your sibling!” 

Hōzuki turns his full attention to Miyuki at that. Yikes. She manages a smile for Terumi and waves. “Good luck.” 

“So. Would Hajime be the sibling you’re looking for.” He states it like he already knows the answer to it. 

Miyuki nods, and Naka has the audacity to look outraged. The other kids in the class are looking on at the spectacle, muttering from the balcony. 

“How’d ya get here so fast? I took the only boat ta Kiri!” Their accent slips out from parts of their words, but not fully adopting the dialect of Shuugetsu.

She ignores them and turns to Hōzuki. She’s got to deal with the important things first. Arguing with Naka comes second.

“Is this idiot already enrolled in the academy?” 

Hōzuki looks faintly amused at Naka’s squawking in the background and answers through the noise. “Paperwork’s filled out and everything. The match was the official acceptance.” 

Ah, fuck. Now there’s no way she can drag Naka back. Reason’s not gonna work with them this time, too. 

She weighs her choices, mind speeding to formulate a response. If she comes back empty handed, Airo’ll be pissed. But if she stays to watch over Naka, Airo’ll be pissed. Either way, their mom’s gonna be pissed and things might actually work out better if Miyuki enrolls in the academy too.

“I’m not here to drag them back. I’m here to enroll, too.”

If she enrolls, she can get more diverse training, which’ll be useful for her to know, and she can keep an eye on Naka. Airo won’t be happy about it, but Miyuki’ll drag Naka home every weekend and they’ll stay on Kiri during the weekdays. 

And there’s no way she’s going through graduation. It’ll be easy. All she has to do is drop out before graduating and bounce. It’s totally foolproof. 

“ _Wha’_?” Naka screeches, “Ya never said ya wanted ta be a ninja!” They’re not even bothering to speak in Kiri’s dialect anymore. 

“I did,” Miyuki deadpans, “Just now.” 

“Yer so annoyin’! Now yer jus’ copyin’ me!”

“Aren’t you the one copying me? I found a teacher first.” 

“Oi! Ya--” 

Hōzuki cuts their bickering off. “I honestly don’t give a shit about your family squabbles and if you really want to enroll, you’re either starting at the basics or you’re fighting a match with someone from the class you want to join.”

“What class is this?”

“The advanced class.” 

Well no wonder Naka had wanted to join this class.

“I’ll join this one then.”

“No way!” Naka shoves themself between Hōzuki and Miyuki. “Jus’ go back! I know yer lyin’.”

“I’ve wanted to be a ninja since I was in the womb,” she says seriously. 

“ _Shaddup_ \--”

“Okay.” Hōzuki drags the word, long and loud. “Karatachi, get down here.” He points at Miyuki. “You. Hajime. Whatever your name is. You’re fighting this kid. No kenjutsu allowed.” He jerks his head at the pool. “Now.” 

Well, good thing she’s aces at water walking. She’ll have to adjust to water walking and fighting at the same time, but it shouldn’t be too bad.

Gingerly, she makes her way to the pool, putting a single foot on the water as a test. Cold water seeps through her shoes and she winces, taking her foot out. Water drips out from her now much heavier shoe, soaking the floor. Lovely. 

“Can I fight without shoes on?” The material of her shoes really aren’t great for water walking. 

Hōzuki lifts a shoulder casually. “Your loss.”

She reaches down to remove her shoes as her opponent nears the edge of the pool. 

“That’s not a good idea.” She places her shoes on the edge of the pool and looks up from her task to see her opponent. 

And wow, this kid is tiny. He’s probably the same height as Terumi, but he seems a little older. He kind of reminds her of a baby ostrich, and his pink eyes are a stark contrast to his ashy hair. 

Her opponent is, unfortunately, adorable. She’d ruffle his hair if he weren’t in an advanced class for learning how to kill. 

“Better than being weighed down by them,” she replies dryly, and his eyes flicker to her shoes. 

She takes his lack of response as her winning the argument, and walks onto the pool. 

The kid, Karatachi, stands opposite to her, and they both wait for Hōzuki to call the start of the match. 

The reality of the situation sinks in and weighs down on her like cold, wet clothes. She’s about to fight someone she doesn’t even know. They’re supposed to be actively trying to hurt each other. 

Nothing about her is remotely prepared for this. Her heart thumps furiously in her chest, and she’s so scared, with unknowns hanging over her head, anxieties choking her throat. Here she is, in an official match, people judging her from the sidelines, about to fight someone whose skills she knows nothing about. 

“Begin,” she hears through the pounding in her ears, and barely manages to move out of the way as Karatachi shoots towards her, fists at the ready. 

Chakra stutters through her feet before surging through her body, her body blocking the onslaught of Karatachi’s blows only through instinct and habit drilled into her by Hirako. She can barely think, Karatachi’s speed and versatile movements are like an iron wall, forcing her to stick with defensive movements. 

She needs an opening, a chance to get out of his pace and start fighting back. 

Karatachi’s fast, arms and legs almost a blur, but she’s fast too, and practiced in the body flicker technique. 

The chakra rushing through her system emboldens her, and subconsciously, she strengthens the bones in her legs, before using the water drops being kicked up from their movements on the water as a screen for her to move behind Karatachi, and in one swift movement, sweeps his legs out from under him. 

He stumbles, eyes wide with shock, but she doesn’t give him a chance to recover and punches him in the stomach, the force of it making him stumble back a few feet and leaving him breathless for a moment. 

Wincing, he starts to make the hand signs for the clone jutsu, but she drives an axe kick through his hands, before flying at him with punches, driving him towards the edge of the pool as he struggles to block them.

Bit by bit, she pushes him back, turning the same strategy he’d started out with on him, and abruptly twists her body to the side, aiming a sudden head kick that has him careening out of the pool and onto dry land. 

“Out of bounds,” she declares, and glares at Hōzuki, daring him to contradict her. There’s no way she’s going to fight until one of them’s unconscious, especially since Karatachi’s a literal child, no matter what the standard in this world are. 

Besides, if she attends the academy, they’ll probably have to beat each other up in the future anyway, and she doesn’t want to do that any more than she has to. 

Hōzuki lets out a huff of air, resigned. “You’re a real piece of work, you know that?” 

He turns to Karatachi, who’s on his feet now, refusing to look at anyone, shamefaced. 

“Traditionally, I’d send you to a lower class, but you adapted well to an opponent whose techniques are more advanced than yours, so I’m letting you stay. Now tell me, what was your first mistake?”

Karatachi grits his teeth. “Underestimating the opponent.”

Hōzuki smirks. “That’s right. You and Okumura both underestimated these two because they’re from the outer islands. You falsely assumed you had the upper hand, and because of that, you were caught off guard.” 

Karatachi nods and bows at Miyuki. “Thank you for the match.” He locks his fingers together, forming the Seal of Reconciliation. “My name is Karatachi Yagura.” 

She scrambles to respond, not expecting him to address her, and unsure what the sparring traditions in Kiri are. They hadn’t made the Seal of Confrontation before starting, so it was strange that he was making the Reconciliation seal now. 

Hastily, she bows as well. “Thank you for the match.” She mimics him, locking her fingers too. “I’m Hajime Miyuki.” 

“Do you need to go to the infirmary?” Hōzuki eyes the way Karatachi is slightly hunched over his stomach, bruises starting to purple on his pale skin. 

“I’m fine,” he responds, and makes his way back up the stairs to where the rest of the class is waiting, ignoring their jeers. What a tough cookie. 

“Your turn, Hajime.” Hōzuki folds his arms and looks at her. She tries not to groan. The match had been kind of a mess, and she wasn’t used to fighting official matches. Sparring was much more straightforward. 

“You’ve got a water-derived taijutsu style that isn’t taught at the academy, but you’re not proficient at it yet, and you’re slow to react to situations. Your body flicker is chūnin level and it gave you the advantage, since most ninja don’t learn it until they’re genin, but if you didn’t know how to use the body flicker jutsu, you would’ve had a much higher chance of losing. You strike quickly, but not decisively.” 

He pauses to appraise the lack of bruises on her body and her straight, barely unruffled posture. It’s the very opposite of Karatachi’s state. Miyuki barely looks injured, which looks odd to outsiders, because Karatachi’s hits were hard enough to bruise. She’d taken a few hits too.

“Still,” he adds, “you hit really hard for a kid. You probably cracked a few of Karatachi’s bones. That’ll be an advantage to you in the future. I didn’t sense you using chakra to enforce your body hits, though. Were you using a technique?” 

Miyuki shrugs loosely. “I just have strong bones.” 

Hōzuki raises his eyebrows. “Whatever you say. Anyway, you and the other Hajime kid are in. You planning on starting immediately?” 

“Ye--” 

Miyuki interrupts Naka’s immediate answer. “No. We have to find a place to stay on Kiri and tell our family we were accepted.”

Hōzuki nods approvingly. “That’s fine. I’ll expect you two at the start of the next week.” He grins at them, sharp teeth fully exposed. “The name’s Sengetsu Hōzuki. I’ll be your teacher ‘til you two graduate.” 

Miyuki bows. “We’ll be in your care, Hōzuki-sensei. We’ll take our leave now.” 

She drags Naka away, ignoring their protests of wanting to start class today, and doesn’t let up until they’re outside of the academy before she lets them have it.

“Are ya an idiot? Did ya even think ‘bout what ya did? Mom’s worried and ya didn’ even leave a note!”

Naka pulls their arm from her grasp. “I knew she wasn’ gonna lemme come! An’ ya didn’ wan’ me ta come either!” 

“Stupid! Did ya think how mom would feel? She’s scared yer gonna get killed! If people find out ‘bout yer heritage--” she hisses, tone lowered. 

“An’,” she continues, not giving Naka a chance to retort, “ya didn’ even think ‘bout where yer gonna stay! Ya gonna sleep on th’ streets? How’re ya gonna get money ta live here? Ya jus’ gonna leave us behind ‘til ya graduate?” 

Nakamura, the nationalistic asshole, is gonna piss himself in joy once he hears she and Naka are joining the academy. He’s definitely going to be willing to fund them, so that’s one problem solved. She still has to come back to Kiri before next week and find them a place to stay. 

Naka, though, clearly hadn’t thought about all the smaller issues. They gape at her, struggling to find words. “I--I was gonna--” They cut themself off, unable to come up with an argument. 

She softly places a hand on their shoulder. The cuts they’d gotten from their fight have already scabbed over. “Jus’ come back an’ we’ll figure it out, okay?”

“Why’d ya hafta follow me?” They pout, blustering through their guilt. 

She pinches their nose, dodging their slapping hands. “‘Cause I’m yer older sister, tha’s why. Now c’mon, ya big baby. We gotta get back before dark.” 

She takes their hand, and the fact that they don’t resist is testament to their guilt. They don’t like it when she treats them like they’re Tetsu or Miho’s age, but they let her hold them close, dodging the crowds of people. 

They make it back safely onto the island, only having to transfer to another boat once, and she lets Naka munch on the dried strawberries Tetsu had insisted on Miyuki bringing. 

They’re both tired, weary from the fight and the long trip, but they make it back just in time for dinner. Tetsu tackles them both in a hug, and Miho follows behind him, clinging to Miyuki’s legs.

Miyuki waits until after dinner to talk to Airo about the academy, knowing that she’ll vehemently oppose it. 

It’s too late for Airo to do anything about it though, she and Naka are already enrolled and she can’t stop Naka from going. Even if Airo tied Naka up, they’d still find a way to escape, so she’s going to have to compromise with them. 

She sighs wearily. Ninja. She tests the word on her tongue, mouthing it to herself. The word cuts into her mouth like tiny razors.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fight scenes kick my ass


	4. four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoops this ch is just grocery store clownery

You know that awkward moment when you’re running errands and you run into someone you know from your class but you’re not close enough with them to chat? Yeah. She’s stuck in that weird limbo now.

Right before that, she’s shopping for groceries so she can stock up the apartment for the weekend, since she’s going back to Shuugetsu and Naka refuses to go back for the weekend like the little brat they are, stating their reason as they want to “stay and train” or whatever. 

She doesn’t trust Naka to eat nutritional meals while she’s away, so she’s loading up on vegetables. Now that they have a stipend for meals and housing is covered by the academy, Naka goes crazy with power from all the money and fills their kitchen with snacks instead of essentials like rice. 

There’s a particularly leafy vegetable she’s reaching for, all lush and green and not a single insect bitten hole in sight, but another hand grabs it first. Pretty vegetables are few on the island since everything is imported and all their money goes to military funding.

She turns to fight for it, and the culprit turns out to be Karatachi. 

He blinks at her with innocent pink eyes, small hand clutching the pristine vegetable. 

“Oh,” she says, not expecting to see someone she knows. Then she narrows her eyes at the vegetable in his hand, because good vegetables come before any kind of social propriety.

“Karatachi,” she starts, “I will absolutely fight you for that, so give it to me now and I won’t beat you up in our next spar.” 

“Seriously?” He looks distinctly unimpressed. “There’s so many things wrong with that. First of all, you can’t beat me, and second, are you seriously going to steal vegetables from someone younger than you?” 

“Excuse me? I can’t beat you? We’ve only sparred like once. How would you even know? And also I don’t care because that vegetable is nice and I want it.” Most of the vegetables in the stall have wilted leaves and are tattered with tiny holes. This vegetable is hers.

Karatachi rolls his eyes and carefully moves the vegetable out of her reach. “Your kenjutsu is shit. And your taijutsu might have improved but there’s no way you can beat me.” He ignores the annoyed sound she makes. “Besides, I want this too. It looks better than the other vegetables.” 

What a brat. He reminds her of her younger siblings. Which means she basically wants to punt his chubby baby cheeks twenty feet away. 

“My kenjutsu might be shit but I don't need a sword to beat you. Or did you forget what happened the last time we fought?”

It’s been a few months since she first came here and fought in an official match against him, but they haven’t been partnered against each other during sparring yet. 

They also haven’t really interacted with each other much since then either, so she hadn’t been expecting him to hold an actual conversation with her. 

He’s about four years younger than her, the youngest in the class, and usually just keeps to himself. It isn’t because he’s reserved or anything, it’s more because the older kids are jealous of him. To be fair, though, the other kids don’t make an effort to talk to her or Naka either, since they’re just shabby country bumpkins in their eyes. 

The teachers have been calling Karatachi the genius of their generation, and he’s in the advanced class for good reason. His skills in basically every aspect of jutsu are ahead of the curve, kind of a jack-of-all-trades situation, except that he’s mastered everything. 

From what she’s noticed, he doesn’t talk to any of the other kids, who go out of their way to ignore him, except for this one really tall shark-looking one. Apparently everyone from his clan, Hoshigaki, has shark attributes, which is why he has actual gills on his face. 

They’re the loners of the class. Karatachi gets ignored for being the best, and Hoshigaki gets ignored for being scary and intimidating. 

The thing is, Hoshigaki’s actually a pretty nice kid, good-natured and polite, but when he’s in a fight, it’s like he’s a whole other person. His bloodlust is off the charts. She’s been partnered with him in a spar only once, and that’d been the most terrifying fight of her life.

There’s just something about having to face a five foot eight year old with shark teeth actually trying to kill you that makes you wish you’d never made the choices that got you here in the first place.

She hadn’t won that fight, since she’d been too busy trying to fight down her body’s instinctive “we’re about to shoot your bones out of your body so you can protect yourself from this kid who wants slice you into a bloody pulp” movements, and she hadn’t been partnered up with him since. 

Usually, Hoshigaki and Karatachi are partnered together for spars, and occasionally Hōzuki will decide to spice it up with Naka taking one of their places, since they’re on par with Hoshigaki in terms of kenjutsu and stamina. 

Which is why she doesn’t know them well, but Naka’s on pretty good terms with the two of them. She’s fine with it that way, though. Naka’s an extrovert and she prefers having her own time to practice Shikotsumyaku and to take naps. 

“We both know that you can’t beat me in a spar, now that I know your abilities better.” Karatachi interrupts her musings, and ok, fine maybe the first match had been a stroke of luck for her, but he could be nicer about it. “Now that we’re clear on that, I’m taking this.” 

He places the vegetable in the basket he’s holding in his other hand, which is filled with an assortment of vegetables and fruits. 

“I’m only letting you have it because I’m nice,” Miyuki says, a little put out. Now she’s going to have to dig under all the grimy vegetables for another nice one again. He’s fun to tease though, like her siblings. “Why’re you shopping, anyway?”

Karatachi looks at her like she’s lost it. “Because I need food.”

Miyuki snorts. “No, I mean, like, why are you doing the grocery shopping alone? Won’t you need someone to help you carry the food?”   
  


She usually makes Naka come and help her hold some of the groceries but since she’s only shopping for two days worth of food, the bag’s not too heavy for her. The weight would be a bit much for a six year old, though. 

“I’m an orphan,” he says, almost uncaringly, and pushes past her to look at a banana stall further in. 

And, oh boy. Her big sister senses are tingling. 

“Don’t get those.” She places a hand on his wrist, moving his hand away from the ripe bananas. “You should get those.” 

He wrinkles his nose. “Those are green. Green is sour.” 

“With bananas, they ripen quickly, so you should buy slightly green ones, since the bananas are being sold in bunch. They’ll go bad before you can finish them if you buy the already ripe ones.”

He stares at her. Looks back to the bananas. 

“Okay.” He picks up the green bananas she’d been pointing to. 

“They’ll be ripe in a day or two, don’t worry.” 

She subtly tries to peer into the rest of his basket. He probably just takes whatever looks prettiest and learns from experience.

He catches her trying to look into his basket and moves it out of her line of sight. “What?”

“Just checking out what other good stuff you’ve hoarded for yourself.” 

“You’re hoarding too, though.” He gestures pointedly at her bag, where she’d obsessively picked out the nicest, juiciest mangoes. 

“Yeah, but you stole from me, so.” 

“I  _ didn’t _ \--” He splutters. 

“Well, you need it more than me anyway.” She places a hand on her cheek in an exaggerated gesture, letting out a fake, relenting sigh. “It’ll help you grow taller.”

“Are you calling me  _ short _ ?” He’s escalated from mild annoyance to ready to commit murder. It’s oddly adorable.

She pretends like she didn’t hear him. “Hm? Oh, you need milk? It’s right over there.”

“That’s literally not what I said-- _ milk _ ? Seriously?” 

She brushes past him, heading to the section with dairy products and dumps five large jugs of milk into her bag. 

Karatachi follows behind her, mutinous. He grumbles under his breath until he notices her now bulging bag.

“Why the hell do you need so much milk? That’s disgusting. You’re going to hurt your stomach.” 

“You don’t like milk? No wonder you’re so small.” 

“I don’t need five jugs of milk when it takes me over a week to even finish one. Unlike you.” 

He glares at her and kicks her mercilessly in the shin. “And I’m not short.”

She clutches her shin, swearing internally, but outwardly smiling calmly like she hadn’t just been attacked in the middle of a grocery store. She has four younger siblings, she basically invented the definition of patience. 

“I need the milk for stronger bones. Why do you think I’m so tall?”

His pink eyes are disbelieving. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but you’re weirder than Naka-san.” 

“That is actually so offensive, take that back right now.” She waves threateningly at him with a block of cheese. “How dare you. I’m so normal. I eat rice for dinner. Naka eats mochi with wasabi.” 

Karatachi stares, silent, judging. He turns around. “This is ridiculous--you know what? I’m just going to go pay.” 

That kid really needs to lighten up. She puts the cheese back.

She heads to the cashier, next in line behind Karatachi.

After paying, she pauses at the door, mildly surprised. Karatachi had waited for her. 

It’s kind of awkward, because she’d kind of been expecting them to just go their separate ways and not talk again until they had to. But he’s standing there, looking equally awkward, clutching his basket with both hands. 

She wants to scream. It reminds her of when Haruto tries to give her a present that he’d made himself. Shy, hoping, looking anywhere but her. 

“Hey.” She greets him with a relaxed smile so he won’t feel defensive. “Heading back home?” 

“Yeah,” he says, and then, to fill the silence, “obviously.”

“Where do you live?” 

“Are you serious?” 

“What?” How’s she supposed to know where he lives? It’s not like she’s actively stalking him. 

“We live in the same apartment complex. The one for all academy students on housing scholarships.” 

“Oh my god,” she says, slightly horrified at herself, staring back at Karatachi’s very done expression. “I can’t believe I never noticed.” 

“Even Naka-san knows. How did you not know?” 

Her brain’s about to explode and splatter all over the road. “Yeah, I dunno. Wow, this is so crazy. We live in the same building.”

“We’ve been living in the same building for months and you never noticed.” 

“Okay, it’s totally not my fault though. Naka always makes us late so I just never see anyone in the mornings.” 

Why is she defending herself to a kid. Why is she a dumbass. These are questions she will ask herself for years. 

“I guess things make sense now,” Karatachi says dryly, “I thought you were just ignoring me on purpose.”

“What?” She’s even more horrified now. “Why would I ignore you? I wasn’t ignoring you. I’m just bad with new people. And no one talks to me anyway, ‘cause I’m from the outer islands.” 

“It’s fine.” He shrugs and they start walking towards the apartment complex. “Everyone in class doesn’t like me either.” 

“Uhhhh.” She’s lost her brain to mouth filter. It’s not like she can say yeah, everyone doesn’t like you because you’re better than them. Comforting little kids who are practically strangers is awkward. She can’t think of anything to say. 

Abruptly, she thinks of the shark kid. “Well, Hoshigaki likes you. And Naka. And also me, because you’re pretty cool. And everyone’s just jealous of you.” 

“Hoshigaki just talks to me because no one else talks to him either. And I don’t care about the rest of the class.” He turns to peer at her, curious. “Naka-san likes me?”

She huffs out a laugh. “They wouldn’t bother talking to you if they didn’t.”

“Naka-san talks to everyone.”

“Trust me, there’s a difference between Naka talking to someone and Naka actually talking to someone.” 

“You just said the same thing twice.”

“Well.” Miyuki feels her eyes curve into her smile as she pats his head with one hand. “You’re cool with the both of us. So.” She hesitates a bit. “You’re our friend now.” 

Karatachi’s footsteps falter slightly. “Friend?”

“Yup, so you should eat dinner with us. I’m making omurice.”

She was originally going to head back to Shuugetsu after dropping off the groceries, but Karatachi looks so small and lost that she can’t help it. She’ll just get a boat early next morning.

“Okay.” He looks down at his feet as they walk. 

The afternoon sun still warms the air, but it’s as cloudy as usual, so the overhead sky is tinged silver. It’s quiet on the road, since they’ve veered off the main road, so she tries to keep a conversation going. Walking home in the gloomy midafternoon silence doesn’t really make for a good time.

Eventually, they hit the topic of training, and she somehow gets roped into training with him after class because she has no self respect whatsoever when it comes to kids. 

She doesn’t even like training with Naka, who’s the only one who she can go all out on because of their Kaguya heritage, but she trains with them when they want her to, anyway. They tend to get a little over-excited and can train for hours on end, whereas she likes nicely timed water breaks.

So now she’s signed herself up for more training during what should’ve been her free time. Great. 

It’s almost worth it though, because she sees Karatachi turning his face away to hide a hint of a smile. 

They drop by Karatachi’s apartment first so he can put down his groceries, and she marvels at the small apartment. It’s fairly clean, and everything is neatly arranged in the way only a child could arrange it.

Why the adults thought it would be fine for an actual child to live by himself is still a mystery to her, especially since there’s a whole bunch of things in an apartment that could hurt an unprepared kid. 

She shakes her head to herself and leads Karatachi to her shared apartment with Naka, who’s out being a public menace or training. They’ll pop up around dinnertime, though. 

Karatachi stands at the entrance of the kitchen, taking everything in. His gaze lingers on the various bags of chips shoved hastily into the half-open cupboards.

“That wasn’t me,” she says, when she catches him staring.

“I guessed.” He glances around the kitchen, uncertain. 

“Wanna help?” She gestures to the vegetables she’s laying out. “You can wash these. Just make sure to roll up your sleeves.”

Dragging over a small stool for him to stand on, she goes back to pulling out the rest of the ingredients and measures the rice. 

The sound of the sink running is soft background noise as she chats with Karatachi, and slowly, he relaxes, reacting more openly.

Dinner’s almost done and she’s regaling him with some of Naka’s childhood stories as she mixes the rice with the rest of the ingredients on a pan when the door slams open.

“Eh?” Naka kicks off their shoes, shoving them to the side. “Weren’ ya goin’ back?”

They blink at Karatachi, who’s paused in mid-laugh, trying to compose himself.

“Wha’s Yagura doin’ here?”

“Manners,” she tells them exasperatedly, “yer so rude. An’ I’m goin’ tomorrow.”

“I was jus’ askin’!” They flop on the couch with their dirty training clothes still on.

Karatachi blinks at the two of them, trying to make sense of their thick accents. She switches back to the Kiri dialect for his benefit. 

“Go change,” she snaps, “you’re dirtying the couch! This happens every time. And Karatachi’s eating dinner with us. Got it?”

“Yeah, yeah.” Naka waves lazily at Karatachi, also switching dialects. “You good, Yagura?” 

“Uh, fine.” Karatachi stutters a little, still not used to interacting with both siblings at the same time. 

Miyuki rolls her eyes. “I said off, Naka! Karatachi, feel free to kick them off the couch.”

“Don’t go infecting little kids with your meanness,” Naka gripes, still sprawled on the couch, “Just ignore Miyu, Yagura.” 

“I will fucking punt you into the ocean right now if you don’t get your ass off the couch and go change!” 

Naka groans loudly and rolls off the couch, landing on the floor with a loud thump. They don’t move from the spot. 

“Are they okay?” Karatachi looks very out of his element. 

“Eh, just kick them a little and they’ll be up.”

“I’m just going to help you set up the table.” He starts laying out the placemats, determinedly ignoring the sight of Naka dragging themself across the floor to their room with all his might. 

Miyuki turns off the stove fire. “Thanks, Karatachi.” She places the large plate of omurice on the table and grins, ruffling his hair. She makes sure to put a healthy splattering of ketchup over the egg. 

“Here, sit.” She pulls out a chair for Karatachi and he sits obediently.

“Naka!” she calls, after everything’s ready, “Are you done? Hurry up!”

“You’re so annoying. I’m coming!” 

Naka rushes out of their room, wearing a freshly washed lilac yukata, hair hanging loose and curling over their shoulders.

Miyuki wrinkles her nose. “Did you comb your hair?”

“That’s for after I shower, stupid.” Naka plops dramatically down in the chair next to Miyuki.

“Well your hair is tangled and you smell bad, stupid.” She pulls the word stupid into a mocking whine.

“Whatever, stupid.” Naka copies her tone, and leans over the table as they reach for vegetables, purposefully letting the ends of their hair fall into her bowl.

“Yer so disgustin’!” Miyuki snatches her bowl away, knowing that Naka had definitely rolled around on the ground. Their hair was filthy. “Stop!” 

Naka sniggers, ketchup staining a bright shade of red on their maroon hair. “My bad,” they reply insincerely. 

Miyuki grumbles swearwords under her breath, clutching her bowl close to her, vowing to rub dirt into Naka’s bowl next time. 

Naka eats cheerfully, turning to talk to Karatachi, who looks mildly alarmed and amused. 

Save for a few more moments of bickering, they finish dinner without anything being broken, and Naka bullies Karatachi into looking at seals with them after doing the dishes.

Miyuki heads back to her room to pack for tomorrow, hearing a faint, “Where’d you get these seals?” as she pulls out a duffel bag from her closet.

After she packs, she heads back to the living room, where Naka is lying on the floor, playing around with some seals, as Karatachi sits beside them, cross legged, looking oddly distant. 

She sits down next to Naka, plucking a seal from their hands. “What’s this?”

“Explosion seal. I wanna see if I can make the blast radius bigger.”

Karatachi interrupts her reply, staring at the ground, face blank. “Hōzuki-sensei is going to skin us alive. He’s going to rip our heads from our bodies with his bare teeth, smiling.”

The realization hits Miyuki like a boulder, but she feels more irk than dread. “Naka, did you steal these? From our teacher?”

“I just borrowed them for a bit, ‘cause we don’t really learn about seals.” 

“So basically you stole.”

“Why would he leave them in his desk drawer if he didn’t wanna share them with us?” 

“His drawers are locked.” 

“Yeah, so I picked the lock.”

“ _ His drawers are locked for a reason. _ ” 

“We’re going to be buried alive, digging our own graves. He’s going to throw us in a bag and let us drown in the ocean.” Karatachi moans, burying his head in his hands.

“Dude chill, it’s fine. Plus there was this really cool scroll. It was begging to be read!” 

Karatachi lets out a high-pitched keen. 

“That.” She picks up the scroll from the ground, examining the complex seals wrapped around it like a lock. The dread is finally settling in. “That is definitely not okay for us to read.”

“Miyu, don’t you wanna figure it out? Look,” Naka pushes the scroll into her face, “it’s so mysterious. Why d’ya think there’s seals locking it?”

“I need to go.” Karatachi tries to get to his feet. “I need to go right now.” 

Naka grabs his wrist. “C’mon, it’ll be fun!”

“Fun?” Karatachi sways like he’s about to faint.

“How many times do I have to tell you not to steal important stuff from adults!” Miyuki places the scroll on the ground carefully, out of Naka’s immediate reach and pulls their ear sharply.

“Ow!” Naka rubs their ear, pouting. “If they didn’t want me to steal then they’d make better locks.”

“This has happened before?” Karatachi asks incredulously.

“Yeah, but last time they weren’t stealing from a jōnin ranked shinobi!”

“It’s not even his!” Naka protests, and lunges over Miyuki to grab the scroll. “It’s Uzumaki, see? The style of the seal writing is Uzumaki.”

“You don’t even know if it actually is.” Miyuki tries to get the scroll back but Naka dances out of reach. She lets her arms drop to her side with a heavy sigh. “The person who wrote it might have just used the Uzumaki style.” 

“Uzumaki?” Karatachi leans forward in spite of himself, interested. 

“That’s why we have to open it to find out!” Naka grins unabashedly at Karatachi, “And the Uzumaki are a clan known for their seals. They’re really powerful and have seals for almost anything. Isn’t that cool?” 

Before either Miyuki or Karatachi can say anything, they start pumping chakra into the seal, activating it.

“Naka, no--” Miyuki shrieks, but it’s too late.

Blue light engulfs the room. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yagura just want friend


	5. five

The scroll opens, traces of Naka’s chakra still lingering in the air.

All of them, against common sense, lean forward to read its contents.

It’s instructions, Miyuki realizes, instructions for a very forbidden seal. 

The seal seems to have some sort of leech-like function, and placing it on someone’s body will slowly drain their life force without them realizing. Even if they find the seal, they won’t be able to take it off unless the person who put it there dies, and the seal will remain until the affected person dies. The death would seem like natural causes to outsiders. 

She sees Karatachi’s face get whiter and whiter as he reads through the scroll. Naka, on the other hand, is eager, hungrily going through every last drop of information on the scroll.

“This is bad,” Karatachi finally says, “and I regret everything.”

Miyuki agrees vehemently. For starters, she doesn’t even want to consider why this kind of scroll would be in the hands of someone who already is at a high level for assassination abilities. Using this kind of technique would mean having to make a death seem natural, when shinobi villages already have flexible rules on killing.

“Well, we read it anyway, so who cares? And I’ve never heard of this seal before.” Naka frowns. “I wonder why Hōzuki-sensei had this scroll though. Aren’t seals and jutsu that play with people’s lives forbidden?” 

“I told you the drawer was locked for a reason!” Miyuki karate chops their head, but not hard enough to hurt. “You made a mistake, and you should fix it. Put it back.” 

“What? Now?” Naka cranes their head to look out the window. “It’s really late though.”

“Yeah, so everyone will be sleeping. Now go put it back.” 

“Why me?” Naka pulls on Miyuki’s hair, whining. “I don’t wanna. And I wanna finish looking at this first. It’ll help me learn more about Uzumaki sealing.” 

She slaps their hand away, annoyed. As if being in the possession of a forbidden technique that belongs to your teacher isn't already terrifying enough--she can't believe Naka wants to keep it. “You’re the one who took it, so you have to put it back. Besides, don’t you think Hōzuki-sensei would notice something so important go missing from his desk?” 

“My final request is for my ashes to be scattered into the sea,” Karatachi tells them solemnly.

“Don’t be so dramatic, dummy. Hōzuki-sensei won’t kill us,” Naka replies flippantly.

Karatachi laughs hysterically. “Oh, that’s funny. Don’t you know people here get killed for lesser reasons? You just broke into our teacher’s--who’s a jōnin--private belongings and then stole a scroll with a forbidden jutsu.”

“Just fucking put it back, Naka, before something bad happens, I swear to god.” Miyuki is five seconds away from a ruptured artery. 

“Can I keep the other seals?”

“ _ No _ .” Karatachi and Miyuki say this at the same time and she feels a sudden kinship with him.

“Fine.” Naka draws out the word, gathering everything they stole into a pile and tugging on their shoes. They open the front door. “I’m going.”

“Please don’t get caught,” Karatachi mutters. 

The door shuts without a response. 

“This is a disaster,” Miyuki despairs, and promptly decides against going back to Shuugetsu this weekend in case Naka has any more unwanted surprises up their sleeve or if Hōzuki suddenly tries to murder them all.

Karatachi slumps, leaning back on his hands. “I will never judge you for anything ever again.” 

Miyuki snorts. “That’s a small comfort, at least.” She looks down at her hands, which she had unconsciously clenched in her lap.

The silence between them gives her space to think.

It’s strange, for sure. Hōzuki is a retired jōnin. How did he not notice a scroll like this disappearing from his desk? Why was he keeping it in his desk anyway? That’s like, the worst place to hide something. 

Actually, now that she thinks about it, a lot of things about Hōzuki don’t add up. Jōnin retirees don’t usually end up as teachers. And he’s from a pretty prestigious clan, as small as it is. He should’ve had plenty of better paying job options.

And why did he retire? He doesn’t seem to be injured, so why did he voluntarily sign himself up to teach annoying little kids for a few hours every day?

Hōzuki’s pretty young too. From what she’s gathered, he’s in his early twenties. He’s not the type to enjoy teaching, either.

Things aren’t adding up. But at the same time, a lot of things don’t add up in this village. It’s built on lies and bloody money and children’s bodies. To go digging through the flaming dumpster that Kiri is, is like asking to get killed.

Karatachi seems to sense this too, and he glances at her. “We’re better off never mentioning this again.”

“Agreed,” she murmurs, still distracted by her thoughts. He’s right. She shouldn’t dig further. And yet--

Her mind spirals deeper and deeper. 

The scroll had opened for Naka, but it hadn’t opened for a jōnin. The scroll is Uzumaki made. That means that there’s a high chance it only opens for those of Uzumaki heritage.

Had Hōzuki guessed? Could he have possibly baited Naka into opening the scroll?

No. If she goes down this path--there's nothing pretty waiting at the end of it. 

She turns to Karatachi, trying to distract herself. “Are you okay?”

“Well, I’ve never broken a rule in my life and I thought Hōzuki-sensei was going to burst in here and kill us all, so, not really.” He shuts his eyes, wrapping his arms around his legs and looking very small. 

The adrenaline is slowly easing off the two of them. They sit quietly, each in their own spaces, swallowed by their own thoughts. 

She barely knows Karatachi; they've just become friends. But all of her spontaneity spurs from her weakness for kids. She hugs him.

He stiffens but relaxes into her hold, and she gives him a gentle squeeze before letting go. “Sorry you had to go through that. Naka tends to do things without thinking. We’ll be fine, though.”

The only good thing, she supposes, that came out of this whole clusterfuck is that Karatachi seems comfortable around both of them now. 

“Yeah, well.” He grins slightly at her, eyes brighter. “Now that it’s over, that was kinda fun, actually.”

“What,” she says, because she thought he was the normal one here. "That was a joke, right? Hahaha." She chokes out air in an ugly mimicry of a laugh. 

"I don't know," he says, looking thoughtful, "I'd do it again." 

He hides the mischievous curve of his cheeks under his hand as she groans. And here she thought they were on the same wavelength.

"Let's wait till Naka gets back safely and without any of us ending up on a hitlist before you go deciding anything." 

This is revenge isn't it. This is totally revenge for her making fun of his height at the grocery store. 

Just as he reaches over to lightly pinch her arm, amused, the door swings open, doorknob slamming against the wall, making them both flinch.

The already baseball sized indent in the wall widens. She winces.

"So nothing happened, which is kinda weird? The lock was closed so I'm pretty sure Hōzuki-sensei forgot to check his desk or didn't notice or whatever. We're cool." Naka strolls in, kicking the door shut with the heel of their foot.

"Can you not break the damn house every five minutes," Miyuki says through gritted teeth. 

"I can't believe we didn't get caught." Karatachi exhales roughly, relieved and exhilarated.

"See? I told you." Naka props a hand on their hip, smug. "You always make a big deal outta nothing, Miyu." 

“ _ I’m _ the one who keeps us outta trouble! And you can’t just do whatever you feel like at the moment. This coulda easily gone a lot worse.” 

Naka makes a face and flaps their hands impatiently. 

“Did anyone see you?” Karatachi doesn’t look too confident in getting away scot-free. 

“No, I checked. And no one followed me either,” they reply as they lazily drape themselves over Miyuki’s back.

“Get off, you’re heavy.” She tries to shrug them off but they just cling harder, whining. 

“I’m tired.” They wrap their arms around her neck, throwing their weight onto her body. She topples over under the pressure, and they fall in a tumble into Karatachi. 

Naka’s foot lands solidly on Karatachi, who grunts from the blow, shoving their foot to the side. 

“Sorry,” she tells him reflexively, struggling to get herself into a sitting position from where Naka is still rolling over her like a giant worm. 

“Stop it!” She pushes upwards at Naka, who grumbles, ignoring her cursing, continuing to pin her to the ground. 

Reaching the limits of annoyance, she digs her fingers into their sides. They shriek, wriggling away, and she uses the distraction to get away. 

Karatachi has moved himself a few feet to the side, out of the line of fire, which is Naka’s flailing limbs, and she joins him, gasping slightly with exertion. 

“If you wanna sleep, go to bed,” she snaps, glaring at Naka, who’s still sprawled on the ground like a starfish.

“Too lazy.” They turn so they’re resting on their side, back facing her. She sighs in resigned acceptance and turns to Karatachi.

“You wanna stay here for the night? It’s pretty late and we have an extra futon.” 

He blinks at her, indecision warring in his features, and Naka jumps up before he can respond.

“Yes! It’s a sleepover!” They run over to the closet, tugging out the spare futon and practically throwing it onto Karatachi’s face.

He splutters, trying to move the heavy futon off of his body as Miyuki helps him heave the futon onto the floor, reprimanding Naka with every sharp movement. 

They dash off to their room, calling a hasty apology to Karatachi for almost suffocating him, and bring their futon out so they can lay it next to the guest futon.

“I guess I’m staying for the night?” Karatachi blinks at her, overwhelmed. 

She flicks Naka on the forehead, extra hard, and smiles kindly at Karatachi. “You don’t have to if you don’t wanna.” 

“No, it’s fine.” He smiles back at her hesitantly. “Do you have spare clothes and other stuff?”

“Yeah, I’ll get them for you.” 

She turns to Naka, stern. “Go shower now. We still have to shower so be quick.”

“Okay, okay,” they say, still rubbing at their forehead. “I’m going.” 

After grabbing clothes, a towel, and a toothbrush for Karatachi, she lets him shower next, listening to Naka ramble about the applications for storage seals as she combs through the tangles of their long hair. 

Curled strands stick to their neck and face, still damp, and she carefully starts to pull their hair into a loose braid. 

The door slides open and she looks up, steam drifting out of the bathroom as Karatachi hovers awkwardly near them. Naka has quieted down and is letting her sift through their thick hair, eyes closed. 

“You’re done?” 

He nods in reply. “Thanks for the stuff.” Twisting his hands in the hem of one of Naka’s old shirts, he stands, uncertain about what he should do. 

She smiles and pats the ground next to her. “Wanna help braid Naka’s hair? I’ve gotta shower now.”

“I don’t know how.” He settles down next to her, watching her hands move. 

“It’s easy. See?” Being deliberately slow, she lets him get used to the patterns of movement before motioning for him to take the ends of Naka’s hair. “You can finish it up.”

He pulls the hairband from her wrist and takes her place, finishing the braid easily. 

“Nice job,” she says, examining his handiwork. It’s neat and straight, which is pretty impressive for a first timer. 

The tips of his ears turn red and he glances to the side, pleased. Naka, who was half-asleep, turns to nod groggily at him in agreement. 

She stands up, dusting off her pants. “I’ll leave you two to it. You two should probably sleep now. G’night.”

“Mm. Night.” Naka lies down, sleepy, and pulls the covers over their chin. 

Karatachi copies them, settling down with a muffled shuffle, lying down flat on their back. “Good night.”

After shutting the lights off, she cups her hand over Naka’s head tenderly, sighing tiredly but affectionately, before she heads off to get ready for bed. 

Nothing had happened after Naka put back the scroll, but she can’t help but have this nagging feeling that this isn’t the end of it. It’s strange, it’s just all too strange.

There’s too many unanswered questions eating at her and any unknowns are another possible enemy. 

But she’s still unsure--should she take the leap? Should she dig deeper, all the way to the skeletons buried in the underbelly of Kiri?

* * *

She takes the leap in a large, glaring miscalculation and lands not on the other side but deep in the yawning chasm hiding graveyards beneath her feet. 

It should have been simple. Find out if Hōzuki knows that Naka is Uzumaki.

The scroll would have resealed itself but would have left evidence of being opened. That means if Hōzuki wants to open the scroll himself, he’ll need Naka’s blood. 

It’s been two weeks since the scroll incident, and since Hōzuki suddenly offered to give Naka some after school training with kenjutsu, she just has to tag along and keep an eye on them. Since they’re training with swords, it’d be easy for Hōzuki to just slice a cut and place some of Naka’s blood in a storage seal. 

Her problem with Hōzuki isn’t that he’s planning to use a forbidden jutsu on someone. It’s that he knows Naka’s heritage now, and that’s a huge risk. That kind of information could be used as blackmail or to compromise Naka’s place in the academy. 

Kiri still has a bit of a grudge against Uzumaki because of their efforts in aiding Konoha during the last Shinobi World War, which means that Naka being exposed as Uzumaki would make them very vulnerable. 

So she tells Hōzuki she wants to watch their practice so she can improve her kenjutsu, and follows them after class.

And the thing is, her guess might’ve been right. She watches Hōzuki nick one of Naka’s arms right before their training ends, and he doesn’t flick the blood off.

Naka stays behind for more training, and Miyuki can’t tear her eyes away from the still-fresh blood lingering on Hōzuki’s katana as he walks away. 

Hastily, she makes up an excuse about heading home first to Naka and follows Hōzuki from a distance. Fear is clenching her heart and she realizes that she really didn’t think this through as she follows Hōzuki into a deserted forest area at the foot of the mountains away from the main streets. 

It’s too late to regret and turn back now, though, so she clamps down on every inch of her chakra and tries to slow down the stuttering of her heart as she perches stiffly on a high tree branch. 

And then Hōzuki pulls out a scroll, details too far away for her to make out, and smears Naka’s blood onto the scroll before pumping tendrils of chakra into the scroll. 

Fuck, fuck, fuck, she thinks, as he neatly copies down the seal onto an empty scroll. She really wishes that she wasn’t right. But now she has confirmation that Hōzuki is using a forbidden jutsu for something and that he knows Naka’s Uzumaki.

She doesn’t know where to go from here. How’s she going to make sure Hōzuki doesn’t do anything with this knowledge? It’s not like she can threaten him. 

Or maybe she can. 

Maybe she can threaten him with the forbidden jutsu. A secret for a secret. But who’s to say that he won’t just kill her for her silence? 

She’s so caught up in her thoughts that she almost doesn’t notice Hōzuki fixing the lines of the seal on the scroll so that it looks like it was never opened. 

He’s done what he had to do and she needs to get out of here, right now.

The sea breeze blows through, rustling the leaves around her, and she uses the sound as a cover. Turning on her heel, she jumps to the next tree, her foot barely grazing the next tree branch when something slams into her, and she falls. 

Eyes wide and helpless against the force, she barely registers the white of Hōzuki’s hair right before she lands painfully on her back, kunai pressed into her neck. 

Hōzuki’s eyes bore into hers, white pupiless irises stretching eerily over black sclera. They widen as they take her in. “Hajime?” 

The sharp press of the kunai doesn’t ease with the recognition. 

“Shit,” she blurts through the cold terror drowning her. 

His features straighten, emotionless. “You know.” 

“Know w-what?” Her tongue feels thick, and her whole body is trembling under his killing intent. 

His eyes narrow into white slits. “Don’t try me, Hajime. I think we both know what’s going on here.” 

He leans closer, the tips of his hair brushing her cheeks, and she reflexively flinches at the sensation, which she immediately regrets. Skin slices into steel at her slight movement, the kunai held so tightly against her that any movement she made would’ve cut her skin open, blood trailing a tickling line down her neck. 

“You’re a smart kid. You guessed that I baited Naka into stealing the scroll, the contents of which you’ve already seen. But you knew I would need Naka’s blood to open it for myself, now that I confirmed that they have Uzumaki heritage, and you followed me to see what I would do.” 

At this, he smiles grimly, sharp teeth exposed. “But that was a rookie mistake. One should never walk blindly into situations where they don’t have the upper hand, Hajime. It’s the type of mistake that means life or death.” 

Sweat rolls down her forehead, sliding past her eyelashes, and she swallows, hard. “Does that mean death for me?”

“You’re a good kid, Hajime, much better than most people on this damned island. I wouldn’t have noticed you if the wind hadn’t blown right then. The sound of the leaves moving against a body gave you away. Your chakra control is good enough that I didn’t even notice you before that. It’s a shame, you know, you have so much potential. But I’ll have to kill you.” 

She hates that he actually sounds sorry.

“Why?” She forces the word out before he can shove the kunai through her neck in a decisive blow. “Why can’t you just let me go?”

“Why?” He snorts, incredulous. “That seal’s dangerous. And you know that I’m going to use it, which means you’re dangerous. I can’t keep a risk like you alive.” 

“Then,” she says, nerves like electricity running through her body, “can I have last words?”

She only has one chance. One chance to make it out of here alive. 

He goes quiet for a bit and nods. “Fine.” 

“Tell my family,” she whispers, deliberately making her voice hard to hear, and he brings his head closer, struggling to hear, “that--”

She shoots an arm bone out of her hand and into his chest, shouting the rest of her sentence. “--you’re a piece of shit!” 

His face goes slack with shock at the thick bone sticking out from his chest and jerks back slightly. “What?” 

He chokes, ruptured blood thickening his throat, and before he can move, she slams her elbow into his stomach, bones hardened into the equivalent of a steel ball, and slips out from under him.

As soon as she’s on her feet, she forces her rib bones out, sinking into Hōzuki’s body like a carnivorous flower. The gaping holes in her body immediately start to seal over, dried blood lingering on her skin. “Now  _ you _ know too much.”

“You’re a Kaguya,” he says, eyes wide. She shrugs, and he smiles sadly. “It really is a shame that you ended up fighting me.” 

And then his body melts into a puddle of water.

Oh,  _ shit _ . He’s right. They’re the worst matchup. A Kaguya versus a Hōzuki. Bone against water.

How’s she going to kill something that can’t even be pierced?

Wildly, she looks around for his real body, wondering when he even made a clone.

There, she thinks, and a white blur closes in on her from the left. 

She barely manages to block his sword with one of her bones, feet sliding back at the impact.

“Good.” He nods, continuing to slash at her without mercy. “You blocked a blow coming in from your weak side. You’ve improved quite a bit since you started.” 

What the fuck? Is he actually trying to be a teacher while he’s trying to kill her? She can just barely keep up with his movements, and with every swing of his sword she feels her arms getting heavier and heavier.

She’s getting tired--his sheer speed is impossible for her stamina to keep up with, and sooner or later, he’s going to land a fatal hit, and she doesn’t have the benefit of having a nice water clone handy. 

She needs to end this, and soon. He continues to talk, movements as precise and powerful as ever. “Your lack of flexibility and stamina in kenjutsu is one of your weak points. And your chakra sensing still needs improvement; I made the clone right before entering the forest.” 

Is this a good time for her to tell Hōzuki to shut the fuck up? She really would, but she needs every breath she can spare. 

One of his hits slam into her and she falters. He seizes the opportunity to try and stab her, but she shoots some of her finger bones out, knocking the sword from his hand. Using the time to leap upwards, she flips down to increase impact momentum, and slams her foot into him.

He blocks it with his arms, but her strengthened bones smash through his like rock onto egg shell, and his bones crack. 

“Fuck, that was a good hit.” Barely wincing the pain shooting through his shattered arms, he manages to form a few hand signs, and before she can hand another hit, there’s bullets made of water rushing right at her face. 

She throws herself to the side, dodging some of them, and moves her back bones partially out of her skin like a shield to block the rest of the bullets. 

Fatigue weighs her body down like the crush of deep sea pressure, and her lungs feel like they’re on fire. She’s too tired to do anything other than defend now.

On the other hand, Hōzuki barely looks winded, aside from his injuries. 

“I have a proposition,” he calls out to her, standing a good ten feet away, deceptively still. 

She clutches a sharpened bone in her hand, back bones still jutting out of her, bruised body aching. She knows a losing battle when she sees one. “Are you not going to kill me?”

“No.” The grass under his feet only bends slightly as he takes a few steps closer. It’s like watching rain drop on grass. “Not if you agree to my suggestion.”

“What is it?” She narrows her eyes warily and refuses to back away when he comes to a stop in front of her. 

“A partnership, of sorts. I’ve got a plan, see, and you’ll be useful for what I want.” His arms dangle at his sides, dotted purple and blue and swelling from the broken bones. “Help me, and I’ll spare you. I don’t really want to have to kill you. It’d be such a shame.” 

“It’s not like I have a choice.” Join, or be killed. Bitter hysteria rises in her. She’d been a fool to think that things could’ve gone smoothly. 

“I’ll take that as a yes.” 

He smiles, the sharp angles of his teeth off-putting, and holds out his hand for her to shake, showing no signs of pain even though the movement should be putting him in pure agony. 

She grasps his hand in a tight grip, teeth gritted. His skin is smooth and cool to the touch, and she squeezes as hard as she can just to be petty. 

“I think it goes without saying that neither of us will mention anything that happened today,” he tells her calmly, words barbed with hidden threats. 

She nods, hands twisted into fists behind her back. 

After all that’s happened, as much as she wants to hate him, she can’t. At least, not completely.

She’s angry, of course, and humiliated, but she’s the one who made the mistake and got caught. He’s just trying to survive, and so is she. 

“Good.” His teeth glint from behind the quirk of his smirk, and he nods at her. “Meet me here tomorrow at eleven. We’ll discuss more of what I need you to do for me.”

“Eleven...in the morning?” Tomorrow’s Friday, she’s bone-tired, and she kind of wants an excuse to skip class. 

“At night,” he says flatly, looking amused. “I know your baby bedtimes are early but that’s the best time.” 

She mutters under her breath in annoyance and he picks up his sword from the ground. “For now, why don’t you head home before Naka comes looking for you? And you might want to put those bones back in your body before someone sees.” 

Wow. She’d completely forgotten that her bones were still sticking out of her like some creepy octopus. Harried, she pulls them back into her body, feeling the familiar smooth slide of bone into flesh. 

Hōzuki watches her, looking fascinated, and she seals the holes in her skin where the bones had been. 

“I’ll never understand how that works.” 

“And I’ll never understand how you turn into water,” she quips. Hypocrite. Kekkei genkai users can have the weirdest abilities, and honestly, she barely even understands hers. 

Like, she knows how to use it, but she just doesn’t get how it works, scientifically. She’s got a different anatomy than other people, but she’s not a scientist or anything, so she doesn’t get the specifics. 

“Fair point,” Hōzuki grins lazily, and makes the hand sign for the body flicker jutsu. “See ya.” 

He leaves Miyuki alone in the clearing with a small puddle of water where he’d been standing. 

Finally giving into her fear and fatigue, she sinks to the ground, legs shaking uncontrollably. 

She’s so fucked. 

She’s always sensed that Hōzuki looks at the village with disdain--he’s part of the generation that felt the effects of the Second Shinobi War on a personal scale, and now he’s got a forbidden jutsu and a plan.

And if her instincts are right--that plan involves assassinating someone very high up. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> me, writing this and realizing how much more i have to write until i get to the next timeskip: time to speed things up


	6. six

It’s not that hard to sneak out unnoticed in the middle of the night. 

Miyuki carefully steps over Naka’s sprawled limbs. Naka had insisted on sleeping in the living room again, especially now that Karatachi was sleeping over a few times a week. 

She figures it’d been lonely for the young boy to go home every day to an empty house, and Naka likes having someone that follows along with their schemes and keeps them from getting in over their head when it comes to their more reckless ideas.

Karatachi is curled up under their blanket, limbs pressed close together, ashy hair gleaming silver under strips of moonlight. Miyuki’s futon remains empty and untouched next to him. 

She slips out the door, twisting the doorknob with hardly a sound. 

The village is all twisting shadows and hungering moonlight in the darkness of night. The streets are barely lit, even on the main streets. She sticks close to the roofs and keeps away from the rowdier streets, full of clamoring, drunken shouts. 

As she nears the mountains, the few artificial lights that light the village dwindle down to nothing, and she stretches out her senses to find the bare tendrils of Hōzuki’s chakra--it’s enough for her to find him but not enough to alert anyone of suspicious activity. After all, most of the ninja in the village are still awake, and neither of them want to risk getting caught. 

She drops down from the tree branch, almost silent except for the slight rustle of leaves against her clothes. Hōzuki nods at her as she wordlessly presents a small bone in the middle of her palm, the code they’d agreed on that’d verify her identity. In turn, he taps his left thigh with his third and fourth finger twice, to prove his identity to her. 

The cold air bites at her cheeks and hands, and she shifts from foot to foot. Neither she or Hōzuki had treated each other any differently since she’d agreed to work for him, but she still can’t swallow the underlying anxiety that grips her with every move. Even though she’s had to lie ever since she found out she had Kaguya blood and is used to keeping secrets, this secret hangs over her head like a blade, a lie on an equally dangerous lie. 

Hōzuki’s arms have completely healed since their fight, and she’s guessing it’s due to the clan’s medic-nin helping him out, since the only hospital on the island is shit and basically makes no difference to people outside of main clans who need medical attention. 

“Hm,” he says, appraising her the way a carnivorous fish would its prey, “you still need to work on concealing your chakra. You might as well be broadcasting your existence to everyone in a six mile radius.” 

She glares. “Seriously? I have to deal with your lectures during the day and now I have to deal with them at night too? And I was trying to sense your chakra, which is why I couldn’t completely conceal mine.”

“Excuses, excuses.” He tsks mockingly and smirks, exposing the sharp glint of his teeth. “You better get used to lectures because I’m not letting you make any mistakes.” 

His expression straightens, mood turning serious. “This job isn’t going to be easy. I think you and I both know the state of Kiri isn’t what it could be. The Daimyō is greedy, lazy, and complacent with letting the rich get fatter at the expense of this country’s people.” 

She winces, not used to hearing the Daimyō get criticized so blatantly in public. Granted, there’s no one else around, but there’s a difference between saying in your head and actually hearing it out loud. 

Hōzuki leans forward, hair shadowing his face ominously. “Don’t pretend like you don’t agree, Hajime. I know the outer islands are itching for a change in the ruling governance but haven’t made a move because Kiri holds all the military power, and Kiri belongs to the Daimyō.”

“I know.” She chokes out the words, because with this, she’s on her way to committing treason. “And I agree. But you can’t change a whole country that easily. Least of all Kiri.” 

Kirigakure is a place that follows tradition when it’s convenient and throws rules into the depths of the ocean when it’s not. There’s no enforcement against crimes, and as long as you don’t touch anyone from the top of the social pyramid.

Social divisions here are unfortunately prevalent in everything people do. And social status comes solely from the village’s pride--families and clans who have been with Kiri since its inception get to stay at the top and people who were defeated in battle and forced to live under Kiri are at the bottom. Miyuki herself is somewhere in the middle. She’s from a Water island, so she’s looked down on for being a country bum, but at least she’s not treated like complete fodder.

Those at the bottom rungs of society are basically meat bags who get tossed into the missions with the worst survival rates. Most of them don’t live for more than one or two years after becoming ninja. 

And worse, the Mizukage doesn’t do anything about the village’s deterioration. Losing chunks of the population, economic decline, fighting battles for the Daimyō’s pride, it’s all nothing to him. She hasn’t even met him and she hates him. 

“Exactly.” Hōzuki’s eyes are dark with anger, voice thick with hatred. “This rotten country and this sham of a village are too deeply rooted in corruption for a simple solution. That’s why we can’t eliminate everything in one strike. We have to take it slow and weed out all the poison before things can change.” 

She blinks slowly. “So who’s we? Aren’t you expecting too much out of me? I mean, I want things to be better too, but there’s too many problems. Like, the older generation. They’re not willing to take action because the war and their fear has worn them down. The younger generation is thirsty for blood.” 

Hōzuki grins, lips curling at the edges like a cat’s claws. “That’s why I like you, Hajime. You don’t think like a kid. You’re right. I don’t have that many allies right now. I want a peaceful transition with the least deaths possible and others want a new government built on bodies.”

“Wait, who are these others?” There’s always opposing sides in politics, but she hasn’t heard of any groups that currently want to depose the Mizukage. 

“Let me finish, brat.” He pats her head, the touch light and soft. “The Hōzuki clan wants a new government, but they don’t want the right kind of change.” 

She feels her breath catch in her throat, weighed there like a large stone. “So you…” The words trail off, her mind racing in multiple different directions. 

A Hōzuki clan uprising. That could spell disaster for the village. The second Mizukage was a Hōzuki, but after his reign, the clan fell into the backwaters. They have plenty of talented ninja, but in a village full of talented ninja, they’re like a dime a dozen. 

Their kekkei genkai is powerful and tricky to win against, but there are plenty of clans with unique kekkei genkai. And when considering the powerful ninja without kekkei genkai, there’s bound to be conflict. 

The tensions between people with kekkei genkai and those without are already bad enough, and if a Hōzuki gets named Mizukage, those tensions will spill into blood. The current Mizukage doesn’t have a kekkei genkai, which has only bolstered the pride of ninja who also don’t have one. 

And the Hōzuki clan doesn’t seem like it’s very interested in the village’s well-being. Well, with the exception of Sengetsu, at least. 

“Yup.” He pulls the word into a lazy drawl, casual, like he’s not betraying his entire clan. “I’m trying to stop them. I want the Mizukage gone, but I don’t want a Hōzuki as Kage either. I’m not gonna let a bunch of wrinkled old men fuck up the village just because they want to relive their glory days.” 

“Fuck.” Now she has to backstab an entire clan while trying to depose the Mizukage? Things are just getting worse and worse. She should’ve just gone home. 

“Now, now.” He says it like he’s trying to calm a crying baby. Except she’s not a baby and she wants to drown herself in the ocean right now, immediately. “No need to worry. I have a plan. And you fit right in.” 

“Can you just please tell me the fucking plan.” She’s tired of all the politics and monologue. She just wants to hear the plan and go home and cry herself to sleep. 

“You’re cranky when you’re sleepy, aren’t you?” Hōzuki has the gall to sound amused. “Here’s what I want you to do. I want you to become a hunter-nin.”

“ _What_?” She hisses, barely bringing her tone down from a scream. 

This is the worst plan ever. And she can’t even tell him why it’s bad because it actually makes sense. It’s just horrible for her because she’s been planning to fail out of the academy. 

But it’s not like she can just tell her actual teacher that she’s going to fail the academy graduation test and go home to live out the rest of her life after she’s learned everything she can from classes. 

“You’ll be fine. I’ve thought about it for a while. Your combat abilities might not be as good as Naka’s but your stealth and tracking is already way above the rest of the class. Your chakra control is good, and you’ve got a secret weapon.” At this, he winks at her, looking pointedly at her forehead, where her clan markings are covered by her forehead. “You’re perfect for their squad.” 

“But I’m not even in the top percentage of the class. And hunter-nin only take academy apprentices if they show top scores in all fields.” 

“That’s fine,” he says, mouth curving mischievously, “because you’ve got me. I’ll recommend you.” 

“Great. Just great. So what do you want me to do there? Spy on them?” 

“Yes, actually. Hunter-nin are granted the highest access to information, right after the Mizukage. They hunt down and erase deserters, after all. They also take most of the espionage missions.” 

“Can I just remind you that I’m only going to be an apprentice and the hunter squad is full of the village’s best sensors?” 

“That’s why I’m going to make your chakra concealment and sensory skills so good, you’ll practically be a ghost. You’ll be doing it in your sleep.”

“No,” she groans. “More training?” 

“Got it in one.” He gives her a thumbs up which she’s pretty sure is meant to be ironic. “We’ll be doing extra training. Every. Single. Day. I don’t like mistakes, didn’t you know?” 

Oh, she knows. His training methods at the academy are already brutal enough. His training outside of class is even worse. She’s seen him train with Naka and it’s not pretty. Hōzuki’s the type to work you until you’ll be reciting katas even if he knocks you unconscious.

His grin turns positively gleeful. “And then I’m recommending you and you’re going to ace their test. Then you’ll be training every day with the hunter-nin.” 

Miyuki has no words. No words. She’s already shaking at the idea of endless training. She’s not the type to work hard on things she isn’t motivated to do, but now she has to do this or die. It’s not gonna be fun.

“Questions?” He looks down at her, looming like an executioner. 

“Yeah.” She’s got a lot, actually. “I know your plan for me, but what’s _your_ plan? Just because I’ll be spying for you and you have a few other allies doesn’t mean that you can overthrow a Kage. And who’s gonna be Kage if you can even take him out? It’s not like there’s a lot of options.”

He’s quiet for a moment, contemplative. “That scroll,” he starts hesitantly, “the Hōzuki head gave it to me after they stole it from the Uzumaki from one of the past plunders. He wanted me to figure out how to open it, because it holds the perfect method to kill the Mizukage slowly and go unnoticed. I’m not from the main branch, but I’m one of their few retired jōnin, so I became a teacher as a way to cover up my research. But I didn’t tell him that I opened it, because I’m going to kill the kage when things are ready and I have more allies. They would be too hasty.” 

Again, he pauses, before continuing. “And you’re right. We need a replacement, but it needs to be someone who cares about the welfare of the village’s people. Kiri’s method of choosing the strongest ninja in Kiri for kage has never really brought good people into power.”

“But what if your clan gets impatient? What if they don’t want to wait for the seal anymore?” She honestly can’t see the Hōzuki elders being ok with waiting a few more years for a single scroll to be opened. And Hōzuki needs time. Time to gather people, to pull them to his side.

“They’re already impatient.” He looks weary, the lines of his mouth frustrated. Miyuki can empathize. Dodging family elders who think they know the best for you, who refuse to break from tradition, even when they’re wrong. It’s grating, whittling you down bit by bit until you’re just anger and silence. 

“I’ve been putting them off by messing with a few of their plans, but they’ve taken the scroll back and if they can’t get it to open, they’ll assassinate the Mizukage, even if it throws the village into civil war. They want to put the current head into power.”

Hōzuki suddenly grins viciously. “But the Terumi want someone from their clan to be the next kage too. Wouldn’t it be a shame if they found out about the Hōzuki’s plans and started fighting?” 

Miyuki stares at him, half horrified and half impressed. “You’re pitting two of the biggest clans against each other as a distraction.” 

“If all goes well, I’ll have time to bring a good kage candidate to my side and build allies in every department of Kiri. By the time the kage dies, it’ll be too late for the conservative factions to push their agenda.” 

He’s terrifying in that moment, even, with his usual slouch and arms folded loosely at his chest. In the silhouette of night, the long, lean form of his body looks like a shark’s. 

“You know, I’m actually kind of glad I’m on your side now.” 

“Told you you’re a smart kid.” His smile widens so that all of his sharp teeth are showing. “See you at six for training. We start tomorrow.” 

He bends down, digging around in one of the pockets of his vest before handing her a scroll on chakra control. After pressing it into her hand, he steps away. “Read that before training.” 

“What,” she protests, “It’s literally almost twelve right now and you’re making me get up at six tomorrow!” 

He laughs, already moving his hands through the familiar hand signs for the body flicker. “That’s your problem, isn’t it?” 

Before she can say anything else, he vanishes, wisps of water misting the air. 

“Goddammit!” she shrieks to the empty spot where he stood, and resigns herself to a sleepless night. 

* * *

Surprisingly, training goes smoothly with Sengetsu--he makes her call him by his first name now, since he hates being tied to his clan name--and their plan is for her to take the test and become a hunter-nin at the start of September, which means there’s only two more months for her to get good. 

Despite his Spartan methods that leave her body sore all over (and by all over, she means every single damn muscle in her body) she’s improved by spades. He’s even making her spar against Hoshigaki and Yagura in class now, which is still as terrifying as it was when she first started the academy almost a year ago. 

At least she’s chill with Yagura now, so sparring with him isn’t so bad because she’s gotten used to the way he fights, after all the time they’ve spent together outside of class. 

Still, it’s awkward being in class, because now that Sengetsu’s spread the word that he’s planning to recommend her as a hunter-nin apprentice, her classmates have started treating her like they do Yagura. Except it’s worse, because she’s apparently a dog from the countryside that’s cheating her way into the squad. 

Each teacher can only recommend one student for hunter-nin, so now that she’s being nominated by Sengetsu, the kids in her class are salty as hell. 

Even Naka had complained to her, even though she knows that they don’t want to be a hunter-nin. They’d whined about her not spending any time with them and instead training with Sengetsu, which they think is unfair, because they want special lessons from Sengetsu too.

And she’s pretty sure they’re a little jealous that Miyuki doesn’t have as much time to spend with them as she did before, when she was just putting an average amount of effort into the academy.

Only Yagura hadn’t said anything about her recommendation for the hunter-nin squad. He’d congratulated her, sincere and sweet, and she’d snuck him a green tea mochi at dinner as thanks. 

There’s two other kids testing for the hunter squad, but they’re both from main clans, so no one’s really giving them shit about it. They’re also older than her--usually apprentice hunter-nin are twelve and above, since most don’t get recommended until after they’ve graduated.

So now that most of her classmates talk shit about her behind her back and to her face, she’s settled for having a pathetic social life. The sad thing is, her social life’s been pretty much her siblings--although she’d occasionally hang out with a few kids on Shuugetsu, she’d never really had time to develop deep friendships, as she was always keeping her siblings out of trouble. 

She’s used to it though, and now she has Yagura, whose straight-laced but sly personality makes for good company, so she’s accepted that she’ll never have that many friends. 

It’s Sunday, and she’s splitting a bowl of green tea flavored kakigōri with Yagura as Naka devours an entire strawberry flavored bowl by themselves at her left, savoring the cool, cloud-like ice on her tongue as she tries not to succumb to the suffocating summer heat. 

All three of them are safe under the shade of the store’s roof, but the building is old and all it has is some crappy, old electric fans scattered at every corner, which does nothing to dissipate the humid air. 

Summers on Water islands are the worst--wet, sticky, and so hot that you can barely bear to breathe. Her body’s just a constant pool of sweat and some old men squatting near the entrance have rolled their shirts up past their stomachs, taking shelter under the roof’s shade. 

She’s stopped going home every weekend now that she’s busy with training, though she sometimes bullies Naka into visiting. Airo hadn’t been exactly elated with her new schedule, but there hadn’t been much of a choice. Miyuki still hasn’t fully explained her current circumstances to her because she doesn’t want Airo to worry any more than she already is.

The thing is, though, she knows that Naka’s aware that she’s keeping secrets--they just haven’t asked her about it yet, because they trust her. Even though Naka can be a pain in the ass, she’s always been closest to Naka out of all her siblings, since they’re almost the same age and spend the most time together now. 

It’s nice, knowing that they’ll have her back no matter what, but she also doesn’t want to get them involved, so she’s refrained from letting anything slip. 

She glances at Naka as she shoves another mouthful of sweet ice into her mouth, silent in her contemplation. Naka slams their empty bowl on the table after slurping all of the syrupy melted ice before sighing and slumping forward onto their arms. 

Yagura, who’s sitting across from her, manages to pile most of the mochi pieces onto his spoon while she’s not looking and eats them all in one bite. 

“I want more,” Naka complains, propping their head on their arm, eyeing Miyuki and Yagura’s half-finished kakigōri with poorly concealed interest.

“Oh hell no.” Miyuki wraps her left arm around the bowl protectively. “You’ve already eaten an entire bowl by yourself and you don’t even like green tea.” 

“Yeah, but now that I’ve had strawberry, I want something less sweet. Balance, ya know? Gotta have sweet and savory for a fulfilling life.” They reach over with their spoon, intent on stealing a bite.

Yagura whacks their spoon with his just as Miyuki mutters, “bullshit, you’re just greedy.” 

“C’mon, just one bite,” Naka wheedles, pouting.

“If you eat this, Hajime, you’re gonna regret it.” Yagura narrows his eyes at Naka and holds his spoon up in a threatening position.

“Oooh,” Miyuki heckles, “he called you Hajime. You’ve been demoted to enemy status.” 

Naka takes the threat as a challenge, as usual, and jabs their spoon toward the bowl so quickly that the spoon’s almost a blur. Their attack is stopped by Yagura’s spoon, and soon enough, they’re basically having a kenjutsu spar with metal spoons instead of swords.

Miyuki takes advantage of their distraction and finishes the kakigōri by herself. 

Yagura and Naka are basically standing up in their seats now, and the moment Naka starts to put a sandaled foot on the table, the store owner is suddenly at their table, shrieking.

“No fighting in the store! Out, out, out!”

Hastily throwing a few bills on the table, Miyuki grabs Yagura and Naka by the collars and drags them out, apologizing all the while. 

“Seriously?” She glares at the both of them, even crankier now that they’re directly exposed to the ruthless heat of the sun. “Restaurants aren’t training grounds.” 

“I didn’t even get to finish.” Yagura frowns, nose slightly scrunched in disappointment, the closest he ever gets to pouting. 

“Oh don’t worry,” Miyuki grins meanly, “I ate it all.” 

Yagura stares at her, betrayed. “I trusted you! I can’t believe you would do this to me. And after everything we’ve been through. This is a crime.”

“Sucks to suck. Friendship means nothing when it comes to food.” Miyuki turns haughtily and starts walking towards their shared apartment building.

“This is all your fault,” Naka grumbles to Yagura, words slightly muffled by the metal spoon in their mouth, “I coulda gotten another bowl but you distracted me.” 

Honing in on the spoon, Yagura groans. “Did you seriously steal the spoon. And that was your own fault.” 

“It’s just a spoon! Also I forgot I was holding it,” Naka says around chewing on the spoon, leaving tiny indents in the metal. 

Miyuki turns her attention to Naka, who’s walking next to Yagura on her right. “Why do I feel like you steal at least one thing from every place we go to?”

“It’s not like they need the stuff,” Naka protests.  
  


“Your morals and questionable habits aside, what the hell’s up with the spoon?” Yagura blinks incredulously at Naka, who’s been chewing the spoon into submission. It somewhat resembles a wrinkled piece of aluminum foil now.

“I told you I was hungry.” 

“I’d question how you’re chewing on a metal spoon like candy, but I’ve learned not to question things when it comes to you.” 

“It’s just strong bones,” Miyuki smirks. “It runs in the family.” 

“I literally hate it so much when you say that,” Yagura replies, irascible. “You say that about everything. Asada asked you why your body-flicker is so good and you just said you have strong bones. I know you’re messing with all of us.” 

“It’s true though.” Smiling guilelessly, she shrugs slightly. 

“I swear.” Yagura mutters a few choice words under his breath, which he definitely learned from her and Naka. Poor kid used to be so nice and polite. Now he’s starting to curse as frequently as the Hajime siblings, which is to say, a lot. 

“I don’t want this anymore. It tastes weird” Naka abruptly pulls the metal from their mouth and tosses the fucked up spoon over their shoulder like it’s a candy wrapper and not a solid piece of metal, a bad habit she’s been trying to fix. 

“You literally can’t do that, that’s fuckin’ littering,” Miyuki says, tone cutting, right as someone behind them screeches.

“The fuck!” 

The three of them turn to see a very angry, short kid with spiky black hair clutching the warped piece of metal, glowering at it intently, like he’s trying to murder it in his head.

Next to him, a vaguely familiar little girl with wavy red hair is clutching her stomach, laughing loudly. “Did you--” She cuts off, hysterical with glee. “Did you just get hit in the face by a weird spoon?” 

“Shut up,” the boy snarls at her, face twisted in fury. He looks straight at Naka, picking out the culprit, who’s staring at the two of them, faintly guilty but mostly amused. 

“You.” The boy spits the word out, practically frothing at the mouth. “I’ll fucking kill you.” 

He lunges at Naka. Miyuki drags a hand down her face in resignation and despair. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im shit at writing about politics but hopefully it wasnt too confusing??? 
> 
> anyway just realized this entire fic is just miyuki being done w life but it be like that so


	7. seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> whoops this chapter ended up having more than i originally planned even though it's kinda just filler and expanding on relationships. this was super hard to write for some reason lmao but it is what it is 
> 
> references and cultural notes at the bottom! anyway zabuza and mei will be back tho

Miyuki swears that she’s never going to have a normal weekend. 

“Don’t you know what a fucking trash can is, bitch?” The angry and surprisingly environmentally conscious boy is shrieking at Naka at the top of his lungs while trying to rip out their hair. 

His red-haired companion has dissolved into a fit of uncontrollable laughter, and is absolutely no help.

“Ow, leggo of my hair! Do you know how long it took for me to comb it this morning? I’ll kill you!” 

Naka tackles the boy onto the ground, where they start wrestling and try to choke each other. 

Miyuki and Yagura look at each other, both dead in the eyes, silently agreeing to break the two apart since the red haired kid seems content to sit back and watch Naka and the angry kid tear each other to pieces.

“Right,” Miyuki sighs, “I’ll take Naka, you take the kid.” 

“Wait, why do I have to get the kid? He’s literally trying to bite their ear off--look!” Yagura points indignantly to where the two are making a spectacle out of themselves in the middle of the street. “I’m not going anywhere near that. He looks like he’ll rip my eyes out if I even go near him.” 

“I’m older, so you have to listen to me.” 

Miyuki doesn’t wanna go anywhere near the angry kid either. He’s like a feral rat with absolutely no fear. He’ll definitely bite her hand off, which is what he’s currently attempting with Naka.

To their credit, though, Naka’s already given him a black eye and is gouging their nails into his arms. They can definitely hold their own.

“What the hell? That’s such a dumb excuse. I’m leaving.” Yagura glares at her, put out. “Actually, since you’re older, you should be taking care of the younger ones. Which is me. I’m getting Naka.” 

Without even waiting for her response, Yagura heads over to the scuffle, only recoiling slightly from the dust being kicked up. 

“You--! Wait--” It’s too late to call him back, though. What a brat. She misses those days when he was like a tiny fluffy baby ostrich. Now he’s just like a cranky, disobedient goose. She gingerly makes her way behind the angry kid. 

With hardly a flinch, Yagura grabs Naka’s arms and starts to forcefully pull them away from where they’re trying to knee the angry kid in the stomach as hard as they can. At Yagura’s touch, Naka starts protesting loudly and furiously. 

“Fuck,” Miyuki mutters, resigned to her fate, and wraps her arms around the kid’s chest so they can’t keep swinging their arms at everything in the vicinity, and pulls them in the opposite direction of Naka and Yagura. 

The kid, however, like Naka, doesn’t take too nicely to their intervention.

“Get the fuck off me!” The kid kicks violently at the air, one of their sandals flying off and hitting Naka squarely in the face.

“Lemme go! I’ll destroy him! I’ll--” Naka’s cut off by the sandal bottom hitting their face with all the grace of someone smacking a fat fly lounging on their food. 

“Hahaha!” The kid bursts out in vindictive laughter at the dumbfounded look on Naka’s face. “That’s what you get, you piece of littering shit! Ass-licking loser!” 

Naka’s face turns redder than their hair. “You’re so fucking dead!” 

Great. Miyuki has exactly 2.5 seconds before Naka goes ballistic and forgets that they’re supposed to be concealing most of their Uzumaki chakra signature. Pride has always been one of Naka’s weak points and this spiky black haired cactus-like kid has managed to push all their buttons in the span of a few minutes. 

The kid responds by laughing mockingly, and is thankfully too distracted by shouting insults at Naka to put any real effort into breaking out of her hold. Naka, though, is just shy of slamming their elbow into Yagura’s face and breaking some of their bones so they can drown the kid in the ocean. 

Yagura doesn’t give in, and with all things considered, he’s actually doing a pretty good job at damage control. Since he’s got Naka covered, Miyuki turns her attention to the spiky kid. 

“Hey.” She lets go of his arms and peers down at him, a good head or two taller. “Why don’t we just go our separate ways and you can stop picking a fight with that dummy over there.” 

He sneers at her. “I’m not backing down from a fight, especially since I was attacked first. You can fuck off or watch me win.” 

“Oi!” Naka bellows from a few feet away, still being held back by Yagura, who’s sweating furiously and looks ready to faint. “Stop trying to make nice with the enemy, Miyu! Just lemme beat up that sea urchin looking jerk!” 

The kid tenses, furious. “Who the fuck are you calling a sea urchin, you trash faced asshole! I don’t care if you’re a girl, I’ll be the one beating you up!” 

Miyuki snatches him by the collar before he can pounce on Naka, arm straining at the surprising amount of strength the boy has. 

He turns to glare at her, teeth bared like an angry cat, the full force of his ire directed at her. “If you don’t let me go I’ll beat you up first.” The amount of killing intent radiating off of his tiny form is impressive.

“Right,” she says, sighing tiredly, “I guess talking it out isn’t gonna work. So--” She pulls the boy sharply towards her so that he stands a few inches away from her, Naka’s shrieking getting progressively louder in the background. She leans closer, smirking menacingly menacingly. “I’m just gonna have to do this.” 

The boy’s eyes widen in fear as she brings her hand closer and closer to his face. “Do what?” he blusters, uncertainty underlying his fierce tone. 

“This.” She pinches his nose shut, laughter bubbling in her chest as he screeches indignantly.

“What the hell?” He tries to pull her hand away, small fingers digging into her arm, but she doesn’t let go. “Get off me! I’m not afraid of you! Let go, you weedy fucker!”

“Not until you promise not to fight.” She smiles patiently as he continues to struggle, cursing nasally. 

“Fine!” He explodes, clenching his fists and anger oozing from his stiff posture. “I’ll fuck off so just fucking let go!”

“Yeah,” the little girl who’d been with him before this all happened finally pipes up out of nowhere, finally deciding to do something about the situation. “I’ll watch him and make sure he doesn’t do anything.”

“Oh,” she raises an eyebrow at the girl, “are you friends?” The two are almost opposites in terms of personality, and the spiky haired boy seems like he’d be a difficult person to befriend. But they do say friendship comes from unexpected places, so who is she to judge?

“Yup.” The little girl grins. “We’re in the same class!” She’s the picture of innocence, bright green eyes sparkling, dressed in a baby blue summer dress, hands clasped behind her back.

“We’re not friends,” the boy bursts out, scowling darkly. Miyuki doesn’t let go of his nose. “She’s my stalker.” Miyuki stifles a laugh. If people could make friends by proximity, she’d have dozens of friends by now. Still, the kid seems like he’s got more of a bad case of denial because he looks more annoyed than pissed off.

“You’re so mean, Zabuza-kun.” The little girl pouts, unbothered in the slightest. “We’re totally friends. We even partner up for spars in class!”

“Shut up,” the boy, Zabuza, snaps. “Just because you’re the only midget worth my time in that stupid class doesn’t mean we’re friends.” 

“Wow, you’re so sweet, Zabuza-kun! I knew we were friends.” She bats her eyes prettily, looking like there could be flowers blooming around her face. Miyuki feels the slightest bit disturbed by their conversation. 

Just as Zabuza snarls, “I’m not sweet!”, she lets go of his nose and all but shoves him at the little girl. “Go be friends and hang out or something.” 

“We’re not friends!” Zabuza roars as the girl smiles brightly and elbows him in the stomach, hard. He doubles over, spluttering, while the girl turns to Miyuki, tugging on her shirt.

“I remember you, nee-san! We met when I was trying to sneak into Hōzuki-sensei’s class. I’m Mei. I never got your name, though.” 

Miyuki pauses, finally realizing why the little girl looks so familiar. It’d been nagging at her the whole time and to be honest, she barely remembers what the little girl from that day had looked like. She just remembers that there’d been someone else there, but she doesn’t give any indication that she had no idea it was her. 

Still, the girl hasn’t given her last name, which is a little suspicious but she lets it slide. Clan politics have been complicated lately. “Yeah, I remember.” She smiles amicably, determined not to scare the girl off or accidentally be mean toward her. “Nice to meet you, Mei-san. I’m Hajime Miyuki.” 

They bow at each other as Yagura shows up with Naka in tow. The shorter boy is clutching Naka by the back of their collar with one hand and pulling on their ear with the other, making them bend slightly to make up for the height difference. Miyuki stifles a laugh as she takes in the sight. 

“Ow, ow, ow! Leggo, Yagura! You’re so annoying!” 

“Not until I know you’re gonna behave yourself.” 

“I will, I will. Now lemme go!” Naka wrenches away from Yagura as soon as he lets go, scampering to Miyuki’s side like an upset puppy and clutches her arm. They know she’s about to scold them and she knows exactly what method they’re trying to use to distract her. “Miyu, Yagura’s being annoying, make him leave me alone. I didn’t do anything wrong!”

Yagura sighs and rubs his forehead like he’s 50 and not 8. Miyuki can relate.

She fixes Naka with a stare, unimpressed. They tug on her arm, eyes wide and pleading. She can feel her defenses breaking down and resigns herself to her fate. Getting angry at Naka is something that happens pretty often, but staying angry with them is a whole trial in itself. “Just. Just stop throwing stuff that you don’t want anymore. Like that spoon. If you’d just thrown it in a trash can this wouldn’t’ve happened. Yeah?”

“Fine. Yeah.” They glare at the ground, sulking. Miyuki nudges their shoulder, raising her eyebrow, prompting them for more. They sigh loudly, directing their gaze to Zabuza.

“Sorry.” The apology is forced out through gritted teeth. Miyuki nods, satisfied. 

Zabuza, who’d been watching the whole scene with sadistic amusement, snickers meanly. “Weak. Guess you’re nothing but--”

He’s cut off by the slap of Mei’s hand against his mouth. Miyuki eyes her in relief. Things had been just about to escalate into another fight and that’s the last thing any of them needed right now. She just wants to get out of these dirty, sweaty clothes and dunk herself into a pool of cold water. 

“I’ll remember this,” Naka hisses, leaning forward. Miyuki grabs their shoulder tightly, starting to steer them in the opposite direction. 

“Oh yeah? You can’t do anything to me anyway, kelp-head loser.” Zabuza leans closer tauntingly.

Miyuku tugs Naka sharply away before they can lash out with a punch. “Can you just _stop_. Are you really trying to fight a kid from the intermediate class?” She bows hastily at Mei and Zabuza because she’s polite and not an actual three year old, and utters a scrambled goodbye. Yagura bows at the same time as Mei and Mei waves at their retreating forms cheerily as Zabuza pulls faces at Naka. Miyuki’s just glad that some of them have manners. 

Naka ignores everything going on around them in favor of screaming curses at Zabuza as Miyuki drags them down the street. “Watch your back, you sea urchin bitch face!” 

“No, you!” Zabuza shrieks at the top of his lungs, “I’ll get you when you’re least expecting it!” 

“Oh my god,” Miyuki mutters under her breath. This better not be the start of some fucked up rivalry, because what’s left of her sanity’s already slipping away, and those two only interacted for ten minutes, tops. 

Yagura’s eye is still twitching by the time they get back to the apartment. “If we run into them again, I swear I’m drowning myself in the ocean.” 

“Get in line,” Miyuki grumbles, herding Naka towards the bathroom so they can wash off all the dried blood and grime caked on almost every inch of their skin. 

“I call next shower,” Yagura says immediately when the bathroom door closes.  
  


“That’s so unfair, I’ve literally been dying for a cold shower since we stepped out of the apartment.” 

“Well, if you didn’t finish all the kakigōri, I might’ve let you go first. Guess it’s too late for you to regret now, isn’t it.” Yagura smirks, flopping on the couch, dusty clothes and all.

Where’d the tiny fluffy baby ostrich kid go? All she sees is another brat in front of her. She misses the days Yagura was too shy to snap back. 

“You’re a little shit.” She gives into her inward battle and lays back on the couch, shoving Yagura with her foot. There’s dirt all over it now, but the cleaning is for another day. Right now, she’s too tired and sticky to move an inch. 

They sit in peaceful silence until Miyuki suddenly pipes up, “Hey. Do you wanna come to our house for the rest of summer break? Naka and I are going home for Tanabata and Obon.” 

Most kids in the academy are from clans, and each clan has their own traditions. Kids from small islands like Miyuki and Naka celebrate different holidays and have unique traditions to each island too, so the academy usually goes on break from mid-June to the end of August. A lot of important events take place in between those three months, so it’s the only time of year when every school has to give the kids a holiday.

Otherwise, she swears, teachers like Sengetsu would totally be forcing kids to stay in school all year. Learning’s a lifestyle, not a choice, he always tells her. He likes to say this when she’s so tired she can barely lift her body and her chakra is nearly depleted. She totally gets why Sengetsu was assigned to the advanced class. If he had to work with the younger kids, they wouldn’t even need a graduation exam to cull the herd, because he’d be doing all the work for them. 

Yagura stares wide-eyed into the distance. She can tell he’s hesitating to answer, which makes sense, really. He doesn’t really know her family, and it’d definitely be awkward for him to stay with strangers for a few weeks. But still, she doesn’t want him to be alone during the holidays.

“C’mon,” she cajoles, “it’ll be fun, and you can try lotsa good food. Shuugetsu’s mochi is crazy good. I’ll take you to eat Kumiko-baa-san’s daifuku. You’ll love it.” She pokes his thigh with her toe. “You can meet the rest of my siblings, too. They’re cute.” 

Yagura sinks further into the couch. “Cute? I’m scared to meet them now. You have a really weird definition of cute.”

“Hey! That is so not true.”

“You called one of the starving stray cats missing at least three body parts cute. I bet you thought that crazy kid Zabuza was cute.”

“All cats are cute! Don’t discriminate. And you gotta admit, Zabuza was kinda adorable. In an angry porcupine ready to fuck you up kinda way.” 

“...That’s not cute. That’s terrifying. Did you see him literally try to tear out Naka’s hair with his teeth?”

“Eh, you just don’t get it ‘cause you’re not an older sibling. When you get to my age, you’ll think every kid you meet is cute.” 

“You’re three years older than me. You’re _eleven_.” 

“Semantics. I’m an old soul.” She fixes him with a flat stare. “So do you wanna come or not?” 

He twists his fingers, messy gray hair melding into the dark gray plush of the couch. “Okay.” 

“Cool.” Miyuki grins widely and leans over to muss up his hair even more. “It’s gonna be great.” 

“Did I just hear Yagura say he’s comin’ with us?” Naka shouts, thundering out of the bathroom, towel hanging around their neck.

“You’re _finally_ done? Why do you always take forever to shower? All you gotta do is rinse your body.” Miyuki eyes their long, tangled hair, resigning herself to another hour of detangling and combing. 

“I like to be clean, unlike you two pigs.” Naka wrinkles their nose at them imperiously. “I need time to relax and do my routine.” 

Yagura snorts incredulously. “Clean? I’ve literally seen you roll around in the dirt for no reason. I’ve seen you make mud pies and not wash your hands afterwards.”

“Yeah, and your routine is so bullshit. All you do is fill up the bathroom with a buncha bottles. What d’ya need five bottles for? You got one body and your hair still comes out looking like an eighty year old sailing rope.” 

“You’re just jealous ‘cause my hair’s the prettiest. Stop bullying me and my hair,” Naka pouts, annoyed, and brandishes their towel like a pair of nunchucks. “Or face my wrath.” 

“Ooooh, I’m so scared,” Miyuki says in the deadest tone she can. “What’re you gonna do? Dry me?”

Yagura snickers, pressing the side of his face into the couch. 

“That’s it!” Naka jumps at them, wet towel and hair slapping Miyuki’s face as they land with a thump on the couch. Bony limbs dig into her body and she winces, shrieking at Naka, and tries to move away from the carnage. Someone’s elbow jams into her stomach and she vaults off the couch, leaving Yagura and Naka to wrestle each other. 

It’s the perfect chance to claim the shower while they’re both distracted, so she darts into the bathroom, shutting the door with an unintentionally loud slam. 

“Hey!” The muffled shout comes from Yagura. She smugly grins to herself, twisting the lock with a sharp and sweet click. Thundering footsteps echo just seconds after she locks the door, and Yagura slams his fists on the door. “I called next shower!”

“You snooze you lose,” she smirks, promptly turning on the shower so that the sound of running water drowns out his complaints. The cold water feels like victory. 

* * *

Coming back to Shuugetsu after months feels like a dream. Stepping off the boat, her footsteps feel unsteady and soundless. She breathes in a warm breeze tinged with nostalgia and anticipation. The rough chatter of fishermen fills the air, its familiarity settling into the briny, salty scent of the seashore. 

“Thank you for the ride,” she says to Kuroi, who’s her go-to person when it comes to getting to and from Kirigakure. She trusts him in an odd way, because he’s the first person who got her to Kiri, and while they’re not exactly close, she knows more about him than his own grandchildren probably do, considering that he likes talking throughout the entire trip. 

“Thank you,” Yagura echoes right behind Naka, who’s bouncing onto the docks, eyes wide with scrutiny. 

“Of course,” Kuroi smiles warmly at all of them, “it’s always nice to see new and old faces around here. I’m sure Miyuki-chan’ll take you to all the best places to eat.” He’s a lot less grumpier than usual--probably because tourist season is at its peak and all the festivals are coming up. He winks at Miyuki, switching to Shuugetsu’s dialect. “Take ‘im ta try some a’ our gōya tempura, won't ya?” 

She stifles a laugh, nodding, as Yagura looks on in bewilderment. Gōya is a vegetable used in a lot of Shuugetsu’s dishes, but it’s incredibly bitter. It’s one of the things they can tell tourists and natives apart with. Shuugetsu natives are used to the bitterness, but they’ve never seen a tourist enjoy it in their first bite. “Tell Daizen-san I say hello.” Since it’s still morning, she bets Kuroi’s heading off to see his fishing buddy, Daizen, who’d been the one to first introduce her to Kuroi. She hasn’t seen him for a while but he always strikes up a conversation when they run into each other.

“I’ll tell ‘im. Take care, now. I don’ suppose yer headin’ back soon, wit’ Obon an’ all.” 

“Tha’s right. Have a good one, Kuroi-san.” 

It’s still early in the morning and the sea glitters under the sun’s rays, making her squint as she scores the beach for any familiar people. Airo’s still mad at her for joining the academy along with Naka and for reneging on her promise to come back home every weekend, but at least one of her siblings would’ve come, right? Tetsu’s apparently been busy with the doctor, Takahiro, but he’d always been close to her and Naka. 

Behind her, Yagura hovers stiltedly, taking in the lush, crystalline bright sights of Shuugetsu. It’s worlds away from the ever-gloomy, misty Kirigakure. Naka’s shoulder is pressed into his, a silent show of support. Naka can be perceptive at times, and they know what it’s like to feel like an outsider.

The docks are more crowded than usual, and from what she can see, the beaches are cluttered with tourists trying to catch an early morning boat tour around the island. A few groups are dressed in yukata with bright, elaborate patterns only wealthy tourists can afford to wear coalesce around the rockier parts, and she knows from experience that they’re getting diving lessons. 

“Ugh, these tourists are clogging up the beaches again. I can’t see anything,” Naka whines, “and they’re so loud and annoying.” 

“Aren’t I a tourist?” Yagura glances uncertainly at the beach, posture still stiff as a board. 

“No, you’re our guest, which is way different. These tourists come with fat wallets and bellies lined with money and litter everywhere and make a mess of things.” Naka’s mouth curves wickedly. “The summer before I started at the academy, I nicked five wallets, and they never caught me. Beat the others by a mile. Those suckers couldn’t even get three before they were noticed.” 

“You’re such a terrible influence,” Miyuki groans, “and you ended up causing more trouble for the shop owners anyway, ‘cause all the tourists were pissed. Besides, we _want_ the tourists to spend.” She turns to Yagura, jabbing a thumb over her shoulder at Naka. “Don’t listen to anything this one says. You’ll just end up in trouble.” 

Yagura rolls his eyes. “I know better by now than to trust anything Naka says.” 

“You guys just don’t know how to appreciate my genius,” Naka sniffs haughtily. 

“Yeah, yeah. Do you see anyone?” Miyuki shields her eyes with her hand, frowning at the mills of people. “If not, we’ll just make our way back by ourselves.” 

“It’s not like the geezer wants to see me anyway,” Naka mutters under their breath. They’re still bitter about how Kazuo’s always treated them differently from the rest of the siblings. To be honest, though, Miyuki isn’t really looking forward to seeing Kazuo either. Her dad’s never been close to her, and they barely talk, other than Kazuo ordering her around. 

“You better not call him that to his face,” Miyuki warns. Naka stopped calling Kazuo “dad” after Airo told them about their heritage. Well, it’s more like they stopped talking to Kazuo altogether. Neither parties have made much of an effort to mend any of the cracks, and Naka’s just taken to referring to Kazuo as disrespectfully as they can. 

“Whatever.” Naka turns away, expression shuttered. Yagura looks between them, confused. Miyuki and Naka never really say much about their parents, but it’s clear there’s bad blood there. Yagura doesn’t know that Naka’s Uzumaki, but she’s pretty sure he has his suspicions. The kid practically lives with them. 

She clears her throat to fill in the awkward silence. Right as she’s about to tell them to go, she spots the small, familiar figure of Tetsu. He’s clutching Miho and Haruto by the hand on each side. Grinning, she nudges Naka, gesturing at the trio, the disappointment that’d been settling in her chest dissipating. “Looks like we got the welcome crew, after all.” 

Naka’s face goes from icy to sun burst bright instantly. “Oi!” They wave their arms frantically. “Tetsu! Oi! We’re over here, ya dumbass!” 

Miyuki sees the moment Tetsu notices them, because he shakes his head slightly before slowly heading over to them. Haruto, still young and learning how to walk, toddles along at a sedate pace, while Miho tries to run ahead, pulling on Tetsu’s arm. 

“Nee-chan!” Tetsu lets go of Miho’s hand when she’s barely ten feet away, and Miyuki bends down just in time to catch Miho as she crashes into her arms. “Nee-chan! Yer here!” Her body feels small and fragile, but her grip is tight. Miyuki’s heart swells with longing and joy. Miho’s the same age as Tetsu was when she left the island. 

“Yeah, I’m back.” She clutches Miho tightly to her chest, eyes and throat burning with tears. Miho pulls away, grinning, exposing the gaps in her mouth where her teeth are growing in. 

“Naka!” She motions at Naka excitedly, the universal sign for wanting to be picked up. 

“Yer such a brat,” Naka says, but they’re smiling as they gather her into their arms. They heft her up easily, muscles hardened from years of training. “Look at ya, yer so big now. Las’ time I saw ya, ya were as big as a green bean.” 

Miho giggles, batting their face. “I wasn’! Yer lyin’, Naka!” 

Tetsu, who’s finally reached them, waves with his free hand, a lazy grin tugging at his lips. He’s mellowed out a lot since she left, but his eyes are still sparkling with mischief. “‘S been a while, huh, nee-chan, Naka-baka.” 

“Shuddup, Tetsu!” Naka makes a face at him that has Miho shrieking with laughter and they turn back to her, distracted. 

“Te-chan.” The childhood endearment slips out, her grin wide and bright. “Ya grew up so much.” She honestly still can’t believe how quickly kids grow up in between a few years. He doesn’t look too different but his whole demeanor is changed. There’s an air of maturity to him now, which is probably the result of being the oldest of the three siblings left on the island and his studies with Takahiro. “C’mere.” 

She holds out her arms and he lets go of Haruto’s hand so he can hug her, his arms warm and solid. Naka’s always been closest to her because of their similar ages, but she’s always had a soft spot for Tetsu, who she basically raised herself. Airo had been in a particularly bad state of mind at the time, and before Miho came along, she hadn’t interacted much with the three outside of necessities. 

“I’m glad yer back, Miyu-nee,” he mumbles gently, cheek squished against her shoulder. “I missed ya.” He lifts his head, mouth curving cheekily. “An’ Naka-baka, too, I guess.” 

“Stop callin’ me tha’! Dumb butt Te-chan!” Naka always manages to devolve into the most childish name-calling when they’re around Tetsu. Miho scrambles out of their arms as they move closer so Tetsu can give them a hug. 

Haruto stays glued to Tetsu’s side, clutching the legs of his worn brown yukata and staring up at them shyly. He was too young when they left, so he doesn’t remember who they are at all. She and Naka are probably like storybook figures to him, abstract but familiar concepts, with their family talking about them and telling stories about them but never getting to meet them until now.

“Nee-cha’?” He tilts his head up her curiously, a slight lisp wrapping around his words. “Nii-chan’?”

She crouches down, looking him in the eye and smiling softly. “Tha’s righ’, I’m yer nee-chan.” She points to Naka. “Tha’s not nii-chan, though. Tha’s jus’ Naka.” 

“Naka,” Haruto says, like he’s testing the word in his mouth. He hides behind Tetsu’s legs. “Hi,” he says, his words muffled by the way he’s pressing his mouth into Tetsu’s yukata. 

Miyuki pats his head gently, his hair thick and soft. At her touch, he pokes his head out slightly, peering at her, his expression shy and sweet. 

“Hey, hey.” Miho tugs at the edge of Yagura’s shirt. “Who’re ya?”

Yagura stares at Miyuki with wide eyes, practically screaming “help me”. She grins sheepishly. She’d been so caught up with greeting her siblings that she’d forgotten to introduce him. 

“Tha’s our friend, Yagura.” She gently tugs Miho’s hand away from Yagura’s shirt. “He doesn’ understand wha’ we’re sayin’, ok? Ya gotta be nice an’ polite.” 

“Ok,” Miho says, hand near her mouth, still looking at him curiously.

“So,” she says, turning her attention to Yagura, who still looks like a deer caught in headlights, switching to Kiri’s dialect, “these are my siblings.” She points to each of them in order. “Tetsu, Miho, and Haruto. I just introduced you to them, so you can greet them if you want.” 

“Um.” Yagura shifts awkwardly and bows. “Nice to meet you, I’m Karatachi Yagura.”

“Nee-chan, wha’s he sayin’, wha’s he sayin’?” Miho bounces on her toes excitedly. While Miyuki translates for Haruto and Miho, Tetsu moves forward, bowing in reply.

“Nice to meet you. I’m Hajime Tetsu. We’re the same age, I think, so you can just call me Tetsu. No need for formalities or whatever.” Yagura smiles, relieved that someone else speaks Kiri’s dialect and put at ease by Tetsu’s easygoing aura. “I can’t believe Miyu-nee actually has a friend and you willingly hang around Naka.” 

Miyuki splutters, caught off guard by Tetsu’s teasing. “Not you too,” she groans. “I’m the oldest here, don’t make fun of me. And I have friends!” 

Tetsu smiles calmly, tone and expression never changing. “Of course you do.” Miyuki literally can’t believe the disrespect. 

“The hell!” Naka bursts out, gaping. “How’s your Kiri so good? And also, I’m a delight. Unlike you.” They stick out their tongue and bend down so they can pick up Miho again, who’s tugging at their pink yukata, bored by a conversation she can’t understand. 

“I’m Takahiro-sensei’s apprentice,” Tetsu replies simply, like that explains everything. It kind of does, too. Takahiro wasn’t born on the island, and as the only doctor on Shuugetsu, he needs to know how to communicate with people from the mainland in case anything happens. Especially during tourist season, with the ones that refuse to listen to their warnings about the steeper areas of the sea and the many sea creatures that live there. 

Naka and Miyuki had sounded really choppy when they first started using Kiri’s dialect regularly, since they got the bare minimum from Shuugetsu’s school and only occasionally picked up some from traders and tourists. It’d taken them a while to develop fluency, but they’d gotten used to it fairly quickly. Still, Tetsu’s Kiri dialect is nearly flawless and she can’t help but feel a little envious of his obvious linguistic ability; he’s always been good with words. 

“How’s that been?” She hasn’t heard much about Tetsu’s apprenticeship other than the sparse letters he sends her throughout the year. 

“Fun.” He grins at her, expression somehow staying rather placid in spite of his obvious enthusiasm. “Let’s get out of here first. I’ll tell you more on the way.” 

“Finally,” Naka groans, already itching to start moving and get away from the persistent buzz of the tourists. They let Miho climb onto their back, her tiny fingers threaded through their long, loose maroon hair. 

Yagura trots a little, catching up with Miyuki and Tetsu, leaving Naka and Miho to walk behind them. Haruto glances at Miho before hesitantly grasping her pants, fingers shoved in his mouth. “Piggyback?”

She laughs a little. She can tell Haruto feels a little left out, and he’s definitely at the age where he wants to do everything his older siblings get to do. “C’mere.” She bends down and lets him clamber on, wrapping her arms around his chubby legs and standing up with a heave. He’s light, barely heavier than the bag she’s gripping in one hand, and she can feel the press of his cheek against her back. 

“You’re learning to be a doctor?” Yagura asks, already initiating conversation with Tetsu as Miyuki messes around with Haruto. She’s asking him a string of questions, trying to get Haruto to open up to her more, but she keeps an ear out towards their conversation. 

“Yeah,” he replies, hands tucked in his pockets, tone smooth and easy. “It’s hard but I learn a lot, you know? Kinda like being a ninja. It’s not much different.” He looks pointedly at Miyuki and Naka, and she’s a little relieved to see that there’s no resentment there. 

Yagura blinks, looking a little surprised. “That’s true. I never really thought about it like that before.” Being a ninja is basically an elite career path in the Water Country, since very few people can actually graduate from the academy or have the skills for it. Most people are just born into it, especially those in clans. Still, it’s not like the civilians glorify them or anything. They’ve been through enough war to know better. 

It’s the clan born that make a big deal out of being a ninja. Civilians have a healthy dose of fear and respect for ninja, but they don’t really think being a child soldier is really a thing to celebrate. Clan born, though, think that the younger they get out into the field, the better. It’s twisted, really, putting all the glory in killing. But it doesn’t change the fact that it’s difficult to become a ninja.

Miyuki and Naka are basically the only kids from Shuugetsu for the past few decades who’ve gotten into the academy and survived. Most kids are content with learning more practical skills, like fishing and diving. Wanting to be a ninja is more a phase for the kids on Shuugetsu. 

Yagura grew up in Kirigakure, though, so his thinking is more similar to those who grew up in clans. It’s not strange that he wouldn’t think of other professions as on par with being a ninja.

Tetsu gives him a breezy smile. “Mmm. All jobs require effort and learning. I just happen to be interested in medicine.” 

“Is Takahiro-jii as grumpy as ever?” Naka interrupts. Miho’s playing with their hair and she’s already made at least ten braids in their hair. 

“He’s only grumpy with you,” Tetsu says pleasantly. “Because you’re a brat who steals his stuff.”

Miyuki snickers at the offense on Naka’s face. “Yeah. You still haven’t returned some of the books you took from him. Not to mention some of his supplies and herbs. What’d you do with all the chrysanthemum, anyway?”

Naka pouts at them. “I just forgot to return them! And I wanted to make chrysanthemum cakes.”

“You can’t even cook.” Miyuki shoots him a flat stare. 

“Well, I was learning!” 

“It’s been two years and you still can’t cook noodles.” 

“Wow, Naka-baka. You can’t cook noodles?” Tetsu’s tone is light, his face curving amicably, and that just somehow makes the hidden sarcasm even worse. 

“Shut up! I can cook when I wanna.” 

“Then how come you never want to.” Miyuki jerks her chin at Yagura, who’s been watching them interact with no small amount of amusement. “This one’s even younger than you and he can make full course meals. 

“I have talents! In many other places!” 

Yagura nudges Naka with his shoulder, grinning impishly. “Sure you do.” 

“Why do I always get bullied!” Naka nudges them back, harder, and their shoving turns into a race. They sprint ahead, Miho bouncing with each step on Naka’s back, trying to one up each other. 

Miyuki and Tetsu are left behind in the dust. They look at each other, mirroring expressions on their faces. She grins, something soft and light bubbling in her chest. 

She really feels like she’s come home. 

The feeling lasts until they get to the Hajime’s front door. The smooth wood is the same as ever, paint peeling at corners. 

Going home isn’t that much of a big deal, but seeing Airo is. She doesn’t know how mad Airo still is, but she can only hope for the best.

She stares at the door blankly, Naka and Yagura lingering at the side, trying to catch their breaths. “She’s still mad, isn’t she?”

“Yeah,” Tetsu says a little awkwardly. “But she’ll be happy to see you two.” 

“Right.” Miyuki takes a deep breath, pushing the door open. 

Haruto scrambles off her back, scampering towards the kitchen, already babbling loquaciously. “Mama!”

“We’re home!” Tetsu calls, bending down to tuck his shoes neatly to the side. 

Naka kicks off their shoes haphazardly and Miyuki sighs, picking them up and placing them next to hers. Yagura copies her, looking uncertain and out of place. 

They all follow Haruto to the kitchen and Miho jumps off of Naka’s back too, but runs to her room instead of to the kitchen. 

Miyuki drinks in the sight of the house, a disjointed familiarity settling in. It looks almost the same as it did when she last left, but it’s a little strange to be coming back after so long. 

Airo’s in the kitchen, shaping some rice into onigiri. Haruto is standing to the side, contently munching on an onigiri with salmon filling. She doesn’t turn around, even though she hears them come in. 

“Hi mom,” Tetsu says. She turns to look at him and he presses a kiss to her cheek. “I’m gonna head ta Takahiro-sensei’s. I’m already late. I’ll be back fer dinner.” 

He waves at them, switching back to Kiri’s dialect. “I’ll see you guys later.” Miyuki squeezes his arm as he passes and he smiles at her before grabbing his bag and leaving. 

Airo’s turned back to the kitchen counter, back facing them. Miyuki winces. So she’s still mad. She’s always hated the silent treatment. The suffocating air, the silence hanging over them like a guillotine. It makes unease writhe in her bones. 

“We’re back, mom,” she says stiltedly. 

Airo makes no indication that she hears them. Miyuki soldiers on anyway. “This is our friend, Karatachi Yagura. He’s staying with us until we head back.” 

Airo still doesn’t say a word or move and Yagura looks at her anxiously. She gives him a quick nod of encouragement. “It’s nice to meet you, Hajime-san. Thank you for welcoming me into your home.” 

At this, Airo finally tilts her head slightly to look at him. She nods, once, before going back to what she’s doing. 

“I hate when ya do this!” Naka explodes, shattering the awkward silence. “Ya think ya can treat us like crap if we don’ do what ya want? Yer our mom, but ya don’ own us!” They pause, face red, hands clenched at their sides. “If yer mad ‘bout something, then jus’ say it!”

Airo spins around, fury sharpening her features. “You are _not_ doing this here,” she hisses, hurrying to Haruto’s side, who’s staring at them, eyes wide and fearful. Tears are building in his eyes. “Get out.”

“Whatever. I don’ need ya. Yer not even my mom.” Naka stomps from the kitchen and they hear the front door slam shut with a bang. 

Miyuki quickly pulls Yagura and follows after Naka, determined to get out of the house as fast as she can. Airo’s gonna need time to calm down, especially after what Naka said. It hurts, to feel her mother treat her like a stranger, to have to treat her similarly in return. She doesn’t have a choice. Things can’t change unless Airo decides to let go of her anger. 

“Oh my god,” Yagura finally bursts out, when they’re a good distance from the house. “What the hell was that?”

Miyku lets go of his hand, pausing to stand at the side, long grass tickling her legs. Naka’s probably run off to the rockier, more deserted parts of the beach, and she’s not running all the way there. “Listen, just ignore whatever the adults say in that house. My mom’s mad at us right now, which is why she’s acting like that. And if anyone says something mean to you, just pretend you didn’t hear it. My parents can be...a lot. My mom won’t really say much to you but my dad won’t be the nicest. He doesn’t really like people from the mainland.” 

“Uh.” Yagura blinks at her, a little taken aback. “You couldn’t’ve told me that before I came?” 

“Yeah, my bad. I kinda just hoped we wouldn’t run into the adults that much.” 

“Well I’m definitely not looking forward to meeting your dad now.”

“Me neither.” 

Yagura shakes his head. “This is crazy.” He hesitates, biting his lip. “Is...is what Naka said true? That your mom’s not their mom?”

Miyuki sighs, propping her hands on her hips, looking out toward the distance. They can see the sea from here, and she fixes her gaze on the wide strip of blue. “It’s complicated. Naka’s related to us, but they’ve got different parents. I mean, you’ve probably noticed how they look different from my siblings.” 

“Yeah. But they never mentioned anything before, so I never asked.”

“Naka’s our family, but some assholes are mean to them because their heritage is more apparent. Thing is, our mom’s not from the island, but she tries her best to hide it. And makes us hide it too. Naka’s name and hair makes them a bigger target.” 

“That’s terrible.” Yagura looks at her sadly. “It’s hard to feel different and be treated differently.” Miyuki squeezes his hand. She can tell he’s speaking from experience. After all, he’s a talented, clanless orphan. That doesn’t make him popular, especially in the academy. 

“Naka’s my family. They’ll always be. I don’t care what others say. They know that, too. So it’s alright.” She pats his head warmly. “All we gotta do is remind them they’ve got family in us.” 

“Us?” 

She laughs slightly. “You’re family too, didn’t you know that?” 

Yagura stares at her, face slack and heartbreakingly hopeful. “I am?” he asks haltingly.

“Yeah, dummy, so it’s your job to remind them that they’re family too.” 

Yagura says nothing, lips trembling. Miyuki smiles and pulls him in for a hug, arms settling gently around him. He immediately returns the hug, hands gripping the back of her shirt like a lifeline. His warmth melts away some of the lingering hurt from earlier. She’s lucky, she realizes, to have met him. To have her siblings. 

“C’mon,” she says after a bit, pulling away and clapping him on the back. “Let’s go find Naka. And stuff ourselves full with dessert while we’re at it.”

Yagura laughs, bright and full. “I want green tea ice cream.” 

“Not if Naka has a say. You know that brat always gets the sweetest flavors.” 

“We can dunk them in the ocean.”

“I’ll get the legs, you get the arms.” 

She holds her fist out for a fist bump and he bumps it, grinning widely at her. The scent of summer lingers on her tongue as she throws her head back and laughs. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes:  
> -much of shuugetsu is based off of ryuukuuan culture and religion. the ryuukuu islands are a chain of Japanese islands that stretch southwest; the biggest of which is okinawa  
> -gōya, which is bittermelon in the ryuukuuan dialect, is a popular vegetable used in okinawa. it’s considered really healthy and refreshing for when it’s hot, but the bitterness can be unpalatable to people who’ve never tried it before  
> -ages for reference: miyuki-11, naka-10, yagura-8, zabuza-6, mei-5, tetsu-8, miho-6, haruto-3  
> -also also silence being weaponized sucks ass and airo is not the best mom lmao

**Author's Note:**

> i haven't written anything other than academic papers in a long time so this fic is basically me trying to remember how to write. it's not gonna be serious and maybe?? short. hope everyone's doing ok


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